MANILA, Philippines — Crawford dropped Jeff Horn with 50 seconds left in the ninth and sent him into the ropes with a slew of punches, ending the fight and winning the WBO welterweight title.
Referee Robert Byrd stopped the fight with 28 seconds left in the round.
“Like I said before, I was the stronger guy,” said Crawford, who landed 48 percent of his power shots, according to CompuBox. “He did everything we expected him to do. He came in there with the intentions of roughing me up and getting aggressive. But the thing he didn’t understand was how strong I was. I think they underestimated me a little bit.
“I’m stronger than him. I just had to get in the ring and prove it. You saw what I did in there. Now I want all the champions at welterweight.”
Crawford (33-0, 24 knockouts) moved up to the 147-pound division and became the sixth fighter in boxing history to win titles at lightweight, junior welterweight and welterweight. Considered by many as boxing’s best pound-for-pound fighter, Crawford relinquished the four major belts he held in the junior welterweight division to move up to a stacked welterweight division.
The 30-year-old from Omaha, Nebraska, improved to 11-0 (eight knockouts) in world title fights, the most wins by an active American fighter.
The 30-year-old Horn (18-1-1, 12 knockouts) struggled to make weight one day prior to the bout, hitting 148 pounds on his first try at the weigh-in Friday. He originally won the belt by decision from Manny Pacquiao last July in his hometown of Brisbane, Australia. He fought once since, stopping Gary Corcoran in Brisbane in December to retain his title.