By Victor Salazar
New York - The welterweight division is still the home for the premier talent pool in boxing. One fighter looking to emerge to the top of the welterweight ranks is United States Olympian Errol Spence Jr (21-0, 18 KO’s).
Spence has a fight lined up in May against IBF world champion Kell Brook (36-1, 25 KO’s) in the United Kingdom. The fight will be televised by Showtime in the United States.
Spence says he’s on a quest to unify all of the titles. Should he beat Brook, he has his eye on newly unified champion Keith Thurman (28-0, 22 KO’s), who holds the WBA and WBC pieces of the belt. The one that would then be eluding him then is the WBO belt held by Manny Pacquiao.
Making a fight with Thurman would come easier as the two are both managed by Al Haymon. A fight with Pacquiao (59-6-2 38 KO’s) might be harder to make since his promoter; Top Rank, has not done much business with Spence’s advisor Al Haymon.
But Spence does not see that as an issue.
“I think Pacquiao is willing to unify, he’s fighting Amir Khan and Khan is with Al Haymon,” Spence told BoxingScene.com.
Spence also can see a fight with unified 140 pound champion, Terence Crawford (30-0, 21 KO’s).
“Terence Crawford is a good fighter, great skills,” stated Spence. “I think it’d be a good fight for 147. It won’t happen now but I think down the road that would be a really good fight.”
Recently, there was a rumor floating around that Spence was dropped from the WBC rankings because he did not enroll in the organization's drug testing program which is regulated by VADA. But Spence says he’s not opposed to the testing protocol as he does want to one day fight for the green belt.
“I did not duck VADA testing,” explained Spence. “WBC dropped me out. I tweeted somebody if they would have had me in the rankings, I would have took it. I called Al’s guy if I had to take the test because, he said not because I’m not in the top 10. I want a WBC title, I want the prestigious green belt so I’ll definitely be enrolled.”