Via Sean Jones: The WBC Board of Governors has approved David Benavidez to compete for the World Boxing Council interim super-middleweight title as champion Canelo Alvarez will not be free to defend his title.
WBC President Mauricio Sulaiman did not say who Benavidez will face for the interim 168-lb title. However, it is likely to be one of the top ten counters in their sanctioning bodies’ ranking:
2. David Lemieux
3. Daniel Jacobs
4. Billy Joe Saunders
5. Anthony Dirrell
6. Jesse Hart
7. Vladimir Sishkin
8. Pavel Silyagin
9. Gabriel Rosado
10. Fedor Chudinov
It wouldn’t be surprising if Lemieux, Jacobs and Saunders all turned down the chance to fight Benavidez for the interim WBC super middleweight title, knowing what they’d face when up against such a formidable puncher. he.
Benavidez will move to 175
Canelo is likely to drop the 168-lb WBC title at some point soon instead of defending it against Benavidez. The chances of Canelo getting back to 168 are slim, that’s why Benavidez should move to 175 and snatch one of the belts to use it as bait for Canelo.
Benavidez had to trap Canelo by touching one of the 175 lb belts. Forget about competing for the 168-lb WBC title temporarily because that title is useless now that Canelo has completed the task.
Benavidez regaining the WBC belt isn’t even worth it because Canelo won’t be fighting him, and Gennadiy Golovkin and Jermall Charlo want nothing to do with him. Other than those two, there was no one else worthy of fighting for Benavidez in the 168-lb division.
If Canelo successfully defeats WBC cruiser class champion Ilunga Makabu to become the 5th world champion, he has plenty of options for himself at 175, 168 and 160.
With Canelo being reluctant to take on the major world champions unless their name is Avni Yildirim, Benavidez has nothing to offer the Mexican star.
Benavidez had no bait to lure Canelo to fight him. Of course, that would change if Benavidez acted quickly by moving up 175 to challenge one of the champions in that tournament before Canelo got to them.
Goals of Betterbiev, Bivol & Joe Smith Jr.
The 175-year-old champions, Artur Beterbiev, Joe Smith Jr and Dmitry Bivol, will likely wait and see if they are picked by Canelo in 2022.
That being the case, they wouldn’t all want to fight a young lion like Benavidez to put their $10 million Canelo lottery wallet in jeopardy.
Still, it’s worth it for Benavidez to try to set up a fight with one of the light heavyweight champions because, at this point, it’s unrealistic for Canelo to return to 168-lb. Now there is none other than Benavidez, and Canelo wants nothing to do with him.
The critical weight class is now 175. Let’s say Benavidez and his board can foresee Canelo’s direction. In that case, they can take advantage of it rather than wait and hope that he gets back to 168-lb a day.
If they make that mistake, they’ll be like middleweight champions Gennadiy Golovkin, Jermall Charlo and Demetrius Andrade, waiting for Canelo to return to 160 lb for the past three years.
These three should have realized that Canelo MUST NOT go back to 160 and move up to 168 to trap him. They didn’t, and they wasted the last three years of their careers turning the wheel of fighting against obscure opposition.
In Phoenix, Arizona, former two-time WBC middleweight champion Benavidez stopped Kyrone Davis in the seventh round last Saturday night.
Benavidez had hoped that Canelo would choose to defend against him next, as he was his mandatory WBC after beating Ronald Ellis by an eleventh round knockout last March in a knockout. remove title.
Among them, two-time WBC 168-lb champion Anthony Dirrell is likely to agree to the duel.
Canelo vs Illunga Makabu for WBC cruiser title
Instead of defending against WBC’s mandatory Benavidez (25-0, 22 KOs), Canelo (57-1-2, 39 KOs) will move up to cruiserweight to challenge WBC champion Ilunga Makabu for his title. in May or June 2022.
WBC President, Mauricio Sulaiman, looked disappointed as he revealed that the board of governors voted unanimously to approve Canelo Alvarez’s promotion to 200th to challenge WBC heavyweight champion Makabu (28-2.25 KOs) for his title in May or June next year.
It’s possible that Sulaiman was hoping that 31-year-old Canelo would have a more climactic next battle against Jermall Charlo, Artur Beterbiev, Gennadiy Golovkin, Dmitry Bivol or David Benavidez.
The interest from the boxing public would be much higher if Canelo were up against those guys than little-known Makabu, who’s had an unremarkable career despite holding the WBC penile weekly belt since January. 2020.
