David Benavidez is open to tournament to face Canelo
On November 13, former super middleweight champion David “Red Flag” Benavidez (24-0, 21 KO’s) will next face the challenge of Kyrone “Shut It Down” Davis (16-2-1, 6 KO’s). Originally, Benavidez was slated to dance with Jose Uzcategui but that was before Uzcategui came up on the wrong end of pre-fight drug testing.
Having been flagged for PED’s, he was hastily shooed off the card. In his place, Davis was only too happy to step in. While there is no doubt that Red Flag is still happy to be fighting, Davis is far from the opponent that he wants to face. There’s little uncertainty that Benavidez would rather sign his half of a contract to dance with the undisputed super middleweight champion Saul “Canelo” Alvarez (57-1-2, 39 KO’s).
Currently, Benavidez is riding a streak of four consecutive knockouts and is widely viewed as Canelo’s biggest fight at 168-pounds. Even though this is a fan friendly dustup, and makes logical and business sense, Red Flag is content to wait for his shot at Alvarez. Or said differently, Benavidez has no problem earning his shot at the redhead.
I’LL TAKE ON ONE AND ALL!
In his last prizefight, the Mexican strong-armed Caleb Plant for his IBF title and thereby become the undisputed super middleweight champion. Having achieved this, there will be a renewed push for the super middleweights to acquire the golden contract. It’s already been suggested that a 168-pound tournament take place and the victor be rewarded with the Alvarez bout. Upon hearing this idea, it’d be easy to foresee Red Flag rejecting the notion. Yet, as he revealed to Fight Hub TV, that was anything but the case.
“To be honest, everybody wants that fight but if they want me to go through all those guys, that’s what I’ll do! I’ll fight Anthony Dirrell again and I’ll fight Charlo too, if that’s what needs to happen for me to fight Canelo. I don’t mind doing that because I feel like I’ll beat those guys, anyway. And I am very confident in myself, so I am willing to put up a chance to fight Canelo after, so I can fight all these guys.”
“And I feel like that’s definitely what the division needs. You don’t need to give handouts! If you give handouts to somebody, you give it to the person who’s been there; who’s won the WBC world championship, two-time WBC world champion and a WBC title eliminator. You know I’ve earned a spot but if I need to fight those guys to get past that, then that’s what I am going to do!”
WISHING ON A STAR?
It’s very exciting to both, hear a fighter talk like this, and seemingly mean it, and day dream about such a tournament. For the fans, so long as one took place, this could be a win-win situation. The dustup between Alvarez and Benavidez would be a hellacious war and probably an instant classic. Benavidez versus Jermall Charlo is just as mouthwatering though. So let’s keep our fingers crossed and hope that one, or more, of these fights happen because they are some truly fine match-ups.
By: Bakari Simpson
