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Less than three months after cementing is legacy among the pantheon of talented ringmasters, Terence “Bud” Crawford ’s run as undisputed super middleweight champion has been cut short. Not by a worth adversary, but by the WBC’s front office.
At their annual convention in Bangkok this week, organization president Mauricio Sulaiman announced that the Nebraska native had been stripped of his super middleweight title for failing to pay sanctioning fees for his last two fights, including the historic September upset over Canelo. According to Yahoo Sports’ Uncrowned, the WBC says Crawford didn’t respond to repeated notices, messages, or warnings about the missing payments.
It’s a strange place for the 38-year-old superstar to land after one of the defining wins of his career. In September, Bud moved up in weight and pieced up Canelo by unanimous decision, collecting the WBC, WBO, WBA (Super), IBF, and The Ring titles in one sweep — marking the third time he’s been crowned an undisputed champion. Even in a sport full of big claims and bigger egos, few résumés hit like that.
But for the WBC, the brilliance didn’t outweigh the bill. The organization says Crawford “allegedly earned $50 million” from the Canelo fight, and while standard bout fees sit around 3% of a fighter’s purse, the WBC claims it dropped the ask to just 0.6% — about $300K. Still, no payment came through. Sulaiman called the silence “a slap in the face,” insisting that Crawford, his manager, and his legal team were contacted multiple times with no reply.
In boxing, politics often hit harder than punches, and this latest hurdle is another reminder of how much the sport’s power dynamics operate outside the ring. For a fighter currently ranked No. 1 pound-for-pound by The Ring, seeing a title vanish over paperwork feels like an anticlimactic twist in an otherwise legendary run.
With Terence Crawford’s WBC belt now vacated, the organization has ordered interim champ Christian Mbilli to fight No. 2 contender Hamzah Sheeraz for the newly open super middleweight strap. Whoever wins that matchup will eventually face Lester Martinez, who held Mbilli to a draw on the Crawford–Canelo undercard.
For now, Crawford’s legacy remains untouched — even if the sanctioning bodies have shifted the landscape.
