The blueprint is laid out for Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez to become the first undisputed super middleweight champion of the world. After all, if the reigning unified WBA/WBC champ takes Billy Joe Saunders’ WBO title on May 8, he’ll be off to the races to cement a clash with IBF titleholder Caleb Plant for a shot at achieving that undisputed glory.
David Benavidez just hopes that the face of boxing doesn’t accomplish the feat and leave the 168-pound division without fighting him. Benavidez returns to action Saturday night, when he faces Ronald Ellis in a WBC super middleweight title eliminator at the Mohegan Sun Arena in Uncasville, Connecticut.
“If (Canelo) does that (becomes undisputed champ and relinquishes the crown), then I’m just going to go and pick up all the titles,” Benavidez told DAZN News over Zoom. “It doesn’t matter to me if I get them from him or everybody else. My job right now, where I want to be at, is I want to be unified world champion.”
But as the 24-year-old undefeated, two-time former super middleweight champion sits back in his chair and ponders that possibility a little further, he sharpens his take.
“Honestly, I think people lose a lot of respect for him if he does that,” Benavidez continues, regarding the possibility of Canelo becoming undisputed champion and not fighting him. “I’m the only person — outside of those two (Saunders and Plant) — that people want to see fight him. I feel like people want to see him fight me more than they want to see him fight Billy Joe Saunders and Caleb Plant.”
With Canelo having destroyed Avni Yildirim in his mandatory defense on Feb. 27, WBC president Mauricio Sulaiman tells DAZN News that Alvarez “has one full year without any mandatory commitments from the WBC” and Benavidez knows Canelo becoming undisputed and abandoning the crown without facing him could be a possibility. That's why he is doubling down on how much respect Canelo would lose from fight fans and critics alike.
“I feel like he’s a great champion and I don’t feel like he’s scared of anybody, but if he does that … there’s a possibility he drops all four belts like that … I think he loses a lot of respect,” Benavidez emphasizes. “I think he loses so much more respect. But if he’s willing to fight me, then I’m extremely ready for him.”
If that day comes, Benavidez believes that he and Alvarez can produce a classic. “El Bandera Roja” vs. Canelo.
“At the end of the day, this could be one of those fights that define this generation of boxing,” he says, exuding confidence. “This could be one of the best fights. I want the respect from the people. It doesn’t even matter about titles to me. I want the respect. I feel like I paid my dues. I’ve been here for eight years, I won the title twice and I’m not scared of nobody.”
Furthermore, Benavidez believes that his attributes and overall fighting style would threaten Canelo in a way that Saunders and Plant aren’t capable of. Why? Well, for starters, Benavidez points to the five-and-a-half inch height advantage and nearly seven-inch reach advantage that he’d have over Canelo. Plus, he has the switch-hitting pop in his punches that Saunders and Plant lack.
“I think to present a challenge or even risk to Canelo, you have to have power,” Benavidez says. “These guys (Saunders and Plant), they don’t sit on their shots. And if you don’t make Canelo respect you, he’s going to walk through that all day.”
For evidence of the latter, Benavidez refers to the way that Canelo walked through and demolished the likes of Sergey Kovalev, Callum Smith and just last month, Avni Yildirim, in a way that he couldn’t against Gennadiy Golovkin “because (Alvarez) respected his power.”
Benavidez also asserts how Kovalev’s long jab was working against Canelo for their whole fight, until the pound-for-pound king crushed him with a combination to win by 11-round KO in their November 2019 clash. His jab would hurt Canelo a lot more, he promises.
“My jab is like a power shot and I could throw it all night,” says Benavidez who counts 20 of his 23 victories by knockout. “I feel like I got the height, I got the length, and I feel like I’m faster than Canelo, too. I throw a lot of the stuff he does: body shots, uppercuts and good combinations, too. There are a lot of similarities there, but I feel like I have the upper hand with height.
“This is the fight the people want,” he adds, “we gotta give it to the fans. I’m ready. Why not?”
One can make the argument that Benavidez should have had his shot against Canelo already. After all, the 24-year-old never lost his title in the ring during his two reigns as WBC super middleweight champion.
Benavidez was stripped of his first reign as champion in 2018 after his urine sample tested positive for cocaine. Although he’d return from a four-month suspension and regain the WBC title with a ninth-round TKO of Anthony Dirrell in September 2018, Benavidez would prove to be his own worst enemy once again — but this time on the scale.
He weighed 2.8 pounds overweight ahead of his scheduled title defense against Roamer Alexis Angulo in August 2020 and had to once again relinquish the WBC strap. Benavidez wound up letting his frustration out by using his vicious switch-hitting style to pummel Angulo toward a 10-round stoppage.
The Phoenix, Arizona native vows that he has learned from his indiscretions and made changes.
“I am the only one that’s beaten myself,” he says. “Now, I really want it, I’m focused, I’m dedicated.”
Benavidez trained for this fight at Big Bear in California, leaving his girlfriend and newborn son behind for full concentration on not being upset by Ellis. As of Monday morning, Benavidez hit the scale weighing 171 pounds — just three away from his target of 168— insisting that his weight will never be an issue again.
“Weight is not a problem anymore,” he says confidently. “I feel like at Big Bear, I get the best out of myself mentally and physically, so I’m going to keep coming back here.”
And there's another prong of Benavidez’ motivation, too: Having to be accountable to his son, who turns six-months-old later this month.
“It has changed me a lot,” Benavidez says about fatherhood. ‘It has made me look myself in the mirror and ask myself what I really want. ‘What type of man do I want to be? What kind of father do I want to be?’
“My son, when he gets older, he’s definitely going to look back — Google is not too hard,” he continues. “If he sees that I messed up in the beginning, I want him to see that after that, I made the decision after I had him to be 100 percent as good of a person that I could be and really dedicated to my craft.
“Now, I can’t just mess up,” he adds with a flat-line delivery. “If I mess up, I’m messing up my son’s life, so I have to be extremely motivated, extremely focused and I don’t want my son to ever see me get hurt in the ring, so that’s why I’m going to work even harder. I want to be his Superman and tough as possible, so he doesn’t have to go through anything like that.”
Benavidez' journey back to the top continues Saturday night against Ellis, live on Showtime.