Canelo Alvarez was one of the countless greats who was front and center at the The Ring awards in London on Saturday night, as several honors, including 2024 “Fight of the Year”, was awarded to the sport’s top stars.
In 2025, the boxing public believes that a bout between Alvarez and Terence Crawford could be a potential frontrunner for the fight of the year.
Over the last 18 months, the super middleweight king Alvarez has been lukewarm about the idea of facing Crawford.
Turki Alalshikh, chairman of the General Entertainment Authority in Saudi Arabia, has been leading the charge in becoming a key player in making the dream matchup a reality.
Alvarez and Alalshikh met over the weekend to discuss future fights, and boxing’s biggest breadwinner opened up about the prospects of finally facing Crawford.
“It’s always a chance there, right?” Canelo said on the red carpet of The Ring Awards. “We’ll see, but there’s always a chance there. We're here to make the best deals, and always the chance."
The four-division champion Alvarez (62-2-2, 39 KOs) – currently ranked No. 7 on The Ring’s pound-for-pound list – is running out of dangerous opponents to face at 168 pounds. Crawford could very well be the perfect dance partner to get the public reinvigorated in Alvarez’s events again after five consecutive workmanlike unanimous decision wins over the last 27 months.
Alvarez has beaten a past-his-prime version of Gennadiy Golovkin in a trilogy fight and the outmatched likes of John Ryder, Jermell Charlo, Jaime Munguia, and Edgar Berlanga in recent fights, and the undersized Crawford (41-0, 31 KOs), a fellow four-division champion and ranked No. 3 on The Ring’s pound-for-pound list, could certainly provide a stiffer test than his recent foes.
After undisputed championship runs at 140 and 147 pounds, Crawford became the WBA 154-pound titleholder in his first fight against Israil Madrimov in August, scoring a unanimous decision against the Uzbek during Riyadh Season’s North American debut show in Los Angeles.
Crawford has been confident that he could comfortably climb two weight classes to clash against Alvarez.
Manouk Akopyan is a lead writer for Ring Magazine. Follow him on X and Instagram.