Boots Ennis Must Step Up Competition

Terence Crawford’s coach, Bernie Davis, asks when Jaron ‘Boots’ Ennis is going to take “his training wheels off” and start fighting good opposition. Davis notes that Ennis (34-0, 30 KOs) has over 30 fights as a pro, but he’s still not stepped up against top-level fighters.

Crawford’s Coach Demands Real Tests

“We’re talking about a guy that has got 30 fights, not two fights. When are we going to take the training wheels off of him?” said Bernie Davis to MillCity Boxing about Jaron Ennis.

“It’s not that I dislike ‘Boots.’ I’m saying put up or shut up. I’m tired of hearing about this and that. But there ain’t no proof in the pudding. Who is he?” said Davis about Ennis, the next opponent, Uisma Lima, on October 11.

Ennis is expected to fight Vergil Ortiz Jr. in early 2026. If that fight happens, ‘Boots’ will still be 28, and his resume will have been better than Crawford’s when he was the same age.

‘Boot’s Ennis Wins by 28

Eimantas Stanionis
Karen Chukhadzhian
Roiman Villa
David Avanesyan
Sergiy Lipinets
Customer Clayton

Crawford’s Best wins by 28

Yuriorkis Gamboa
Ray Beltran
Ricky Burns
Thomas Dulorme
Briedis Prescott

Those fighters were excellent when they were younger, but by the time Crawford fought them, they weren’t in their prime anymore. None of them were. Crawford took advantage of their depleted state to pad his record, and really never did step up against fighters in their prime. Canelo Alvarez was a shadow of his former self at 35, and not anything close to what he once was.

Nation Vegas’ Torch: Training Wheels? Bud Wore Them Too

Interestingly, Ennis’s resume is almost identical to Crawford’s when he was 28. There’s no difference. Terence was fighting notable older guys on the downside of their careers, like Ricky Burns, Ray Beltran, Briedis Prescott, and Yuriorkis Gamboa. All these guys were running on fumes by the time Crawford fought them.

It wasn’t until Crawford was 29 that he stepped up for the first time in his career to fight Viktor Postol in 2016. Bud’s coach, Bernie Davis, doesn’t recognize that he’d not fought any elite or A-level opposition.

Even when Crawford fought Postol, that wasn’t an elite-level fighter, and none of the guys he fought in his 30s were. The closest thing to elite that Crawford has fought is Israil Madrimov, and you can make an argument that he should have lost that fight on May 3, 2024.