Amir Khan may have been looking for a way out during Saturday night’s frightful beating at the hands of Terence Crawford.
With one wayward left hand, Crawford gave it to him.
Khan, who was floored in the opening round and systematically broken down over the next four, absorbed a punch well south of the beltline early in the sixth. The shot was ruled an accidental blow by referee David Fields and Khan would have been given five minutes to recover, but the Bolton fighter’s corner instead informed the referee after about 40 seconds that he wouldn’t be able to continue, sparing him the gruesome denouement that appeared more inevitable with each passing minute.
Thus Crawford retained his WBO welterweight title by technical knockout at the 0:47 mark of round six, an announcement that prompted a downpour of jeers from the crowd of 14,091 at Madison Square Garden. The unbeaten American led by scores of 50-44, 49-45 and 49-45 in his second defense of the title he captured from Jeff Horn last year following an exhaustive three-year cleaning-out of the 140lbs division, where he unified all four major belts.
“I could tell I was breaking him down,” Crawford said. “It was just a matter of time. I just took my time. I was disappointed the corner stopped the fight in that manner, but Virgil [Hunter] is a great coach, and he was looking out for his fighter. I know he didn’t want to go out like that.”
It was an unsatisfying ending to a fight that proved a mismatch from the opening frame when Crawford, after two minutes of deliberate calculation, detonated a counter right on Khan’s jaw that sent him clattering to the deck. The challenger beat the count but was nearly put down a second time in the final seconds before he was saved by the bell.
“We made sure this whole camp that we was going to start fast,” Crawford said. “We made it a point because Khan’s a faster starter. We didn’t want to give him no confidence out the door.”
Crawford continued to turn the screw over the next two rounds, alternating orthodox to southpaw stances flawlessly and picking Khan apart with pinpoint accuracy, having timed his opponent to perfection. Then came the fourth when Crawford connected with a left hook and a counter right to back Khan up early and then began stalking the challenger around the ring, pounding away with vicious shots to the body.
The end came less than a minute into the sixth round after Crawford’s left hand landed low.
“I seen Amir Khan’s face and he was shaking his head and I was getting disappointed the whole because I knew that he was looking for a way out,” Crawford said. “Not the way that I would have liked to finish the fight. But Virgil is in his corner for a reason and that’s to look out for his fighter. He felt that his fighter didn’t want to fight anymore so he stopped the fight.”
He added: “I felt like I was touching him more and picking up the intensity. He was looking for a way out. I hit him on the leg and his coach stopped the fight and he got it.”
Khan, whose face was badly marked up when he arrived at the post-fight press conference shortly after 1am, said the final shot landed in his groin area but that it was his Hunter who made the call to stop the fight.
“I felt it in my stomach,” he said. “I would never quit. I would rather get knocked out. I one of them fights who’d rather get knocked out in fights. I have been knocked out because I’ve tried to win fights.”
Indeed Khan has and famously in the various seasons of a very good career. There was the 54-second destruction at the hands of Breidis Prescott, the tactically inept defeat by Danny Garcia and the one-punch walk-off in his bold challenge for Canelo Álvarez’s middleweight title nearly three years ago.
But never before Saturday had Khan been so comprehensively outboxed.
“I knew in my heart that I could outbox him,” Crawford said. “He said he’d never been outboxed but I haven’t either. Today was the day where one of us was telling the truth.”