Terence Crawford moves up to junior middleweight to challenge WBA champion Ismail Madrimov on Saturday at BMO Stadium in Los Angeles. (ESPN+ PPV, 6 p.m. ET). The WBO interim title will also be on the line.
Crawford (40-0, 31 KOs), of Omaha, Nebraska, is a two-division undisputed champion, a feat accomplished by only two other men boxers (Naoya Inoue and Oleksandr Usyk). Crawford is coming off an impressive performance against Errol Spence Jr. in July 2023. In that fight, Crawford dropped Spence three times to eventually score a ninth-round TKO win at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas to unify all four major welterweight world titles.
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Saturday, 6 p.m. ET on ESPN+ PPV: Terence Crawford vs. Israil Madrimov, 12 rounds, for Madrimov's WBA «super» junior middleweight title and the vacant WBO interim junior middleweight title
Crawford, 36, is ESPN's No. 2 ranked pound-for-pound fighter and the top welterweight fighter.
Madrimov (10-0-1, 7 KOs), of Khiva, Uzbekistan, won the title by defeating Magomed Kurbanov by fifth-round TKO back in March, on the Anthony Joshua-Francis Ngannou undercard in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
Madrimov, 29, is a decorated amateur fighter with almost 100 fights. He turned pro in 2018 and has notable victories over Raphael Igbokwe and Michel Soro.
Also on the card, heavyweight Jared Anderson steps up in competition to face Martin Bakole in a 10-round battle of power punchers. Anderson (17-0, 15 KOs), of Toledo, Ohio, is coming off a unanimous decision victory over Ryad Merhy back in April. He's consider the «next» American heavyweight.
Bakole (20-1, 15 KOs), of Kananga, Democratic Republic of the Congo,
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