Bob Arum: Fighting Terence Crawford would be great for Conor McGregor

MMA’s Conor McGregor is back in the win column now, and has had his name recently linked to a couple of potentially major crossover fights with Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao. Well, Bob Arum wants to throw Terence Crawford’s name in the conversation too.

“You’ve got an elite boxer in Terence Crawford fighting an elite MMA guy in Conor McGregor under MMA rules. You don’t think that would be interesting and something the public would want to see? I think it’s very realistic.”

Crawford himself has been open by saying that he’d be willing to actually make the crossover to MMA to face McGregor should he have a reasonable amount of time to prepare for that kind of fight, but that given his wrestling experience he likes his chances in that arena.

Arum has taken those comments and has since been fanning the flames of the potential for a Crawford-McGregor fight, saying it would be a good look for the Irish star.

“Fighting Crawford would be great for McGregor because he has no chance in a boxing match except to pick up a check. In an MMA match, he would be the favorite, but Crawford would have a chance because he’s one tough dude and because he has a wrestling background. I think that Crawford is the one boxer that can compete with an elite MMA guy under MMA rules. We’d do two fights so we can level the playing field by fighting in both disciplines. Mayweather and Pacquiao would never fight under MMA rules. Crawford would.”

So it appears Arum has sort of had a change of heart in terms of his sentiment about MMA-Boxing crossover fights, as he just a few years ago proclaimed Mayweather-McGregor as being a ‘ridiculous’ idea that shouldn’t be allowed.

Crawford, 32, is most recently coming off of a stoppage win over Egidijus Kavaliauskas last December to retain his WBO welterweight title.