Dana White has always been a big fan of championship boxer Terence Crawford and now he finally has the chance to promote him.
On September 13, one of the biggest boxing fights in recent memory will take place between Terence Crawford and Canelo Alvarez when the two clash for the undisputed super middleweight title.
One of the biggest talking points ahead of the fight is the fact that UFC boss Dana White will be the main promoter of the fight with it being TKO boxing‘s inaugural event.
White has already shared the stage with Crawford and Canelo as he had to step in and break up a near-brawl when the two clashed at the pre-fight press conference earlier this year.
Photo by Steve Marcus/Getty ImagesDana White talked about promoting Crawford six years before super fight involvement
Although this will be White’s first big step in the sport of boxing, he has had a small involvement prior to this event as he has helped promote Irish boxer Callum Walsh throughout his career and even created an event for him in Ireland last year.
The UFC mogul has always been open with the fact that boxing was his first true love before MMA as he grew up as an aspiring boxer himself.
Over six years ago at UFC 241 headlined by Daniel Cormier and Stipe Miocic, none other than Crawford was sat on the front row watching the spectacular action, picking the UFC card over a boxing event that was on in Vegas at the same time.
And following the event, White talked about Crawford being in attendance, going on to talk about how he would promote him if he was one of his fighters.
“Yeah, that was interesting (to see Crawford in attendance). We were happy to have him and he’s a stud and he chose the right card to come to,” White told Helen Yee at the time.
“I didn’t (get the chance to talk to him), no, it was a little crazy that night but I saw he was there and he was cruising around taking pictures with everybody and we showed him on TV so, I’m glad he came out and I hope he had fun.
“(I’d promote him) just like we promote all of these guys here. First of all in boxing, there is no brand, I always talk about the machine, the UFC machine that we’ve built here and when we put guys that are talented in the machine, you start to build them and there’s nothing like that in boxing, that’s what I wanna build,” White continued.
Terence Crawford is now in Dana White’s ‘machine’
And now six years after White’s comments about one of the pound-for-pound best fighters on the planet, Crawford is officially part of Dana White’s ‘machine’ and it is still yet to be seen how the UFC boss will use his expertise to promote this mega event.
With this being White’s first official event under the TKO boxing banner, it is unclear where he will take the promotion from here and how often he will look to put on boxing events.