Spence and Crawford go to war…On Twitter

The buzz is all around about these welterweight top dogs– the consensus and utterly undisputed top two 147-pounders in the world today– finally getting in the ring to settle their differences and leave zero doubt as to who’s the very best. The only thing left to do, however, is actually make the fight– and that’s proven to be the hardest part of getting this rivalry settled.

For now, the feud is raging on Twitter with this latest flare-up touched off by Crawford’s trainer Brian McIntyre.

“Man, Bud gon’ dominate him,” McIntyre recently told FightHype.com “Bud gon’ dominate him, just like I said in my tweet. Bud gon beat the sh** out of him. Mark my words. That’s what I said.

“The reason why I say this is because I’ve been watching Spence a long time…To me, he’s still doing the same thing. He may have gotten stronger, he may have improved on some of the things that he’s doing in camp, but as a trainer, he’s still doing the same thing. If he ain’t changed then, he ain’t gonna change by the time he get in there with Terence. That’s why I say what I say.”

This assessment drew the ire of Spence, who lashed out at McIntyre and questioned his boxing acumen by spotlighting the trainer’s less than stellar 7-14 professional record.

“This bum ass n***a,” Spence wrote, underneath a screen cap of McIntyre’s BoxRec ring record.

Spence’s attack pushed Crawford to a response.

“@ErrolSpenceJr look at that guy record tho,” Crawford wrote, underneath a screen cap of his own 38-0 BoxRec record. “That’s the guy who gone beat yo a** in real life, not the guy you posted for likes.”

Spence would counter with a crisp: “Not gone lie 38-1 still a great record.”

And then came yet another counter from Crawford, referring to an alleged Spence problem with Cognac: “You a comedian now I see you must be on that yack.”

“Lol,” Spence countered. “nah we saving it for after I beat yo a**..but u kno ain’t sh** goin to be funny for u when that bell ring.”

“Not at all you right, because ima be to busy whooping yo as**,” Crawford responded. “Then ima laugh when I see yo facial expression when you know you getting yo a** whooped and there’s nothing you or anybody can do to help you.”

Spence would finish up this flame war with a crisp and decisive: “you got it I’m not typing nothing else until its a go.”

Well, there you go. The war before the war…hopefully.

But fans have seen Spence and Crawford go at it before, with little to show for it. Back then, the issue was the two fighters competing for rival companies, contractually unable to meet one another.

Since late last year, though, Crawford has left Top Rank promotions and is now a free agent. With little in the way of legality standing between them, one would think that this must-happen fight would be infinitely easier to put together. The only thing standing between the two right now is ego (the purse split being the biggest ego-driven hurdle to overcome). But ego could very well be the major factor separating the two, even dating back to when both fought for rival companies.

One thing is for certain, though. If the Spence-Crawford feud doesn’t fly off of social media to be resolved man-to-man in the ring, both fighters will take some serious flak. Their respective legacies may never recover.