Claressa Shields at the premiere of the movie The Fire Inside on December 4, 2024. IMAGO / Future Image

Claressa Shields Convinced Terence Crawford Will Dominate Canelo Alvarez

Originally posted on KO on SI | By Grant Young | Last updated Jul 12, 2025 6:58 PM ET

As the September 13 showdown between Saul "Canelo" Alvarez and Terence Crawford continues to approach, it seems that many members of the boxing community are changing their initial stances about how the fight will go.

When news of this bout was announced, the general sentiment seemed to be that Canelo had the advantage, given that he's much bigger than Crawford and that Crawford is moving up several weight classes in order to challenge Canelo for his unified super middleweight belts.

However, after Canelo's lackluster performance against William Scull on May 3, many have begun to believe that Crawford might be so much better of a boxer at this stage in their respective careers that he'll negate this size disadvantage. Not to mention that these two facing off after that Scull fight conveyed that Canelo isn't the bigger man by much.

CANELO ÁLVAREZ SHOVES TERENCE CRAWFORD AT THE FACEOFF #CaneloCrawford pic.twitter.com/5mL73DQOIq
— Netflix (@netflix) June 22, 2025

As a result, many are now siding with Crawford to beat Canelo. And legendary women's boxer Claressa Shields made her stance extremely clear when speaking with FightHype on July 11, while she was at Madison Square Garden to watch the Katie Taylor vs. Amanda Serrano trilogy.

"You know I got Terence Crawford beating Canelo," Shields said. She then added, "I ain't gonna say knockout, but I think he's gonna box [Canelo's] shoes off."

Shields and Crawford have a great relationship and have shown each other a lot of support over the years, as both are multiple-time undisputed champions. Therefore, while it wasn't necessarily a surprise to hear her siding with Crawford, she seems quite convinced that he's going to have his way with Canelo.

Time will tell whether her prediction is correct, as the bottom line is that the boxing world has to wait and see until September 13.

This article first appeared on KO on SI and was syndicated with permission.

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