Kellerman’s Controversial P4P Pick: Crawford Over Usyk And Inoue

Fight analyst Max Kellerman says he’s got Terence Crawford as his #1 pound-for-pound in the sport above Oleksandr Usyk and Naoya Inoue, going into Crawford’s superfight against undisputed super middleweight champion Canelo Alvarez on September 13, 2025.

Kellerman says he has Crawford (41-0, 31 KOs) above undisputed heavyweight champion Usyk and undisputed super bantamweight champion Inoue because he thinks he’s “better” than them. He was impressed by Crawford’s narrow win over Israil Madrimov on August 3, 2024, and overlooked the many fans who felt the judges had given Terence a gift decision.

Usyk’s Impressive Boxing Record

• Daniel Dubois
• Tyson Fury x 2
• Daniel Dubois
• Anthony Joshua x 2

Kellerman points out that Crawford “annihilated” Errol Spence Jr. before that, knocking him out in the ninth round on July 29, 2023. He doesn’t mention that Spence hadn’t looked good since his terrible high-speed car crash on October 10, 2019, which had left him struggling to beat his two opponents, Yordenis Ugas and Danny Garcia, after the crash.

Moreover, Ennis had been out of the ring for 14 months going into his match against Crawford and had put on a lot of weight that he had to trim off during training camp. Fans on social media believe it wasn’t the prime version of Ennis that Crawford beat.

“There’s a reason that I think Crawford is the best pound-for-pound fighter. Canelo once was,” said commentator Max Kellerman to Ring Magazine, picking Terence Crawford as the #1 pound-for-pound fighter in the sport.

Analyzing Crawford’s Recent Fights:

• Israil Madrimov
• Errol Spence
• David Avanesyan
• Shawn Porter
• Kell Brook
• Egidijus Kavaliauskas

Fans don’t view those fighters as PPV #1 worthy for Crawford. They don’t stack up with Usyk’s recent wins at heavyweight.

Kellerman’s P4P Rankings

“I know people think [Naoya] Inoue and [Oleksandr] Usyk are ahead of Crawford. The Ring has them ahead of Crawford. I don’t because to me, pound-for-pound is not a fairness issue. It’s an issue of who do you think is better,” said Kellerman.

Two boxing experts who disagree with Kellerman’s view of Crawford as #1 pound-for-pound:

“Crawford’s technical brilliance is unmatched, but Usyk’s doing things at heavyweight that we haven’t seen since Ali. I lean Usyk because of the division’s difficulty,” said former trainer Teddy Atlas on his YouTube channel, ‘The Fight.’

“Crawford’s win over Madrimov was impressive, but Usyk’s victories over Fury and Dubois in the heavyweight division, where the stakes are higher,” said writer Mike Coppinger while he was still with ESPN.

Having seen how Crawford struggled against Madrimov, getting out-punched, my personal choice for #1 pound-for-pound is Usyk. The way he defeated the much bigger Daniel Dubois, Tyson Fury, and Anthony Joshua twice in the last two years puts him ahead of Terence.

The Panel of Disagreeing Experts

“And the last time I saw Crawford, he moved up yet another division, beat at the time the guy [WBA junior middleweight champion Israil Madrimov]. I thought he was the best fighter in the division at the time. And before that, he had just annihilated Errol Spence. So, if you look at all the boxes, I’m going to check Crawford for most of them, if not all of them,” said Kellerman.

Crawford beat Madrimov by the scores 115-113, 116-112, and 115-113. Vergil Ortiz Jr. defeated Madrimov in what many boxing fans felt was a more impressive fashion than Crawford in his win on February 22nd, 2025.