Early on during the COVID-19 pandemic, Terence Crawford made it clear that he would need to be paid more to fight in an empty arena.
Either Crawford received an uptick to his paycheck or backed off his demands as his promoter at Top Rank, Bob Arum, confirmed to ESPN that the pound-for-pound star will return to the ring on November 14, to defend his WBO welterweight title against former 147-pound champion Kell Brook. While the location wasn't revealed, it's expected to occur in Las Vegas as the Nevada State Athletic Commission on Wednesday unanimously approved the fight card to take place at "The Bubble" at the MGM Grand.
Crawford (36-0, 27 KOs) moved up to welterweight after knocking out Julius Indongo to become the undisputed junior welterweight champion in August 2017. In his first time out at welterweight in June 2018, "Bud" wiped out Jeff Horn to capture the WBO strap. The 33-year-old has successfully defended the belt three times, dominating and stopping José Benavidez Jr., Amir Khan and most recently, Egidijus "Mean Machine" Kavaliauskas. Now, Crawford takes on a Brit for the second time in three fights.
Brook (39-2, 27 KOs) is no stranger to coming to the U.S. for a championship. Back in August 2014, Brook defeated Shawn Porter to win the IBF welterweight belt at the Stubhub Center (now Dignity Health Sports Park) in Carson, Calif. After jumping up two weight classes to middleweight and getting thrashed by Gennadiy Golovkin, Brook went back down to welterweight and lost the IBF belt to Errol Spence Jr. in May 2017. The 34-year-old's fought infrequently since then by only fighting three times, most recently a seventh-round TKO over Mark DeLuca in February.