Crawford slams WBC, declares Ring belt the ‘real title’

Terence “Bud” Crawford’s reign as the World Boxing Council’s (WBC) 168-pound champion was short-lived — and he didn’t lose the title in the ring. The Omaha native has been inactive since defeating Mexican star Canelo Álvarez for the undisputed super middleweight championship in mid-September. Instead, he lost the belt on paper.

On Wednesday, WBC president Mauricio Sulaimán told media members at the organization’s 63rd annual convention in Bangkok, Thailand, that Crawford had been stripped of the WBC 168-pound title for failing to pay the sanctioning fees for his fight with Álvarez. Crawford still holds the World Boxing Association (Super), International Boxing Federation (IBF) and World Boxing Organization (WBO) super middleweight titles, as well as The Ring magazine belt.

“He forgot how he got to make $50 million [against Canelo],” Sulaimán said. “It’s very unfortunate that the WBC did not even receive an acknowledgement of receipt nor anything in response to any of those communications.”

Sulaimán said the WBC agreed to reduce its standard 3% sanctioning fee to 0.6% of Crawford’s $50 million purse for the Álvarez fight — and Crawford still refused to pay.

“It’s very complicated to withdraw a title from a champion — it hurts deeply. Terence Crawford has been very successful, a five-division world champion for 13 years,” Sulaimán said. “It is just terrible. Not even a thank you or ‘I’m sorry.’ No response.”

Later in the day, Crawford responded to Sulaimán and the WBC with a fiery, profanity-filled rant on social media.

“I see Mauricio got a lot to say about me not paying him $300,000 plus another $100k-something for sanctioning fees,” Crawford said. “Then he’s going to tell me I didn’t even apologize. Like, who the [expletive] do you think I am? Boy, you’ve got to slap your [expletive] self. I’m not paying your [expletive] anything. What are you talking about, pay you $300,000? What makes you so [expletive] better than any of the other sanctioning bodies?”

“Huh? Answer that question. What makes you better than the WBO, the IBF or the WBA? Everybody accepted what I was giving them, but the WBC thinks it’s better than everybody, don’t you? You’ve got the green belt, which doesn’t mean [expletive].”

Crawford went as far as to call The Ring magazine championship the more prestigious title.

“The real belt is the Ring belt, which is free, [expletive]. What are you talking about? You want me to pay you more than the other sanctioning bodies because you feel like you’re better than them? How in the world?” Crawford said. “All the sanctioning bodies agreed to the same amount, but you sit your [expletive] up there and say I need to apologize to you? You can take the belt. It’s a trophy anyway. Why am I paying you every time I step foot in the ring?”

After stripping Crawford, the WBC swiftly ordered Christian Mbilli vs. Hamzah Sheeraz for the vacant title.