Seattle Seahawks and New England Patriots collide Feb. 8 for the big game at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, Southern California, but as sports events filled with high-pressure moments go, the NFL’s championship match isn’t as big as boxing when its at it’s best.

That’s according to Terence Crawford, who recently retired with a 42-0 (31 KOs) shortly after out-classing Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez in arguably the most meaningful win a boxer posted in 2025.

Considering Crawford’s world titles won across five weight classes, and his wins over Canelo, Errol Spence Jr., and Kell Brook, the 38-year-old is used to holding his nerve during high-stakes sporting spectacles.

For many, the Super Bowl is the epitome of those moments.

Crawford disagrees.

Speaking on the Pivot Podcast, Crawford said: “Boxing is a bigger event and more pressure than the Super Bowl.”

“I’m not taking any credit away from the Super Bowl. That’s the biggest event. [But] when we compare the two, man, c’mon … you have two men fighting each other.”

Crawford then elaborated on why the stakes are so much higher in a box office bout in boxing than it is in the Super Bowl.

“You can’t call a timeout or make a substitution when you’re tired. It’s simple. You can’t switch teams.”

Suepr Bowl viewing figures have more than doubled since the first event in 1967 when an average of 50 million people watched the big game from its embryonic phase in 1967 through the 1970s, exploding significantly around 2010 when it began breaking the 100 million barrier again and again. Last year, 127.7 million people watched Super Bowl LIX on Fox.

When boxing is behind a paywall, it cannot compete with those numbers, attracting 4 million buys in its most-watched events from the past. However, in recent months, broadcasting mainstream-friendly fights on OTT platforms like Netflix has shown the potential boxing has when it’s in front of, not behind, a paywall. Anthony Joshua’s eventual knockout of Jake Paul, for example, peaked at 65 million concurrent streams worldwide.

“Every [person from the] sports world wants to be a boxer,” Crawford said, speaking of the potential boxing always has, regardless of its blips. “Even soccer moms want to train boxing. I haven’t seen one sport not paying homage to boxers. You can’t name it. You see every [person] wanting to be a football player? 

“They see us at a high level, but they don’t see the work we did to get to that level. You see [football] players coming out of college at 18, 19, they might get on the right team and play in the Super Bowl, and they might not have done anything as a backup. You can’t do that in boxing. You’ll get hurt.”