Fans want to see Caleb Plant against Christian Mbilli to see how he fares against one of the top five contenders in the super middleweight division.
This would give Plant a chance to prove he can beat one of the elite contenders, something he has never done during his decades-long career.
Plant’s claim to fame is beating the smaller guys, many of them bottom feeders, and the card champion he fought to briefly become the IBF 168-lb belt in 2019.
Fighting the WBC #1 contender, Mbilli (28-0, 23 KOs), would give Plant the opportunity to prove she can beat a top-five man.
Plant career = All Smoke and Mirrors
Plant has not fought a top-five level fighter in five years since his close 12-round unanimous decision win over IBF super middleweight champion Jose Uzcategui in 2019.
Caleb Plant’s Best Wins:
– Jose Uzcategui: Paper Champion
– Anthony Dirrell: 38 years old
– Trevor McCumby: An unproven fringe candidate
– Caleb Truax: 40 years old
– Mike Lee: Contender Fringe
– Vincent Feigenbutz: Unknown fighter
– Rogelio Medina: Journeyman
That was against an average fighter who didn’t belong as a champion. After losing to Plant, Uzcategui was immediately beaten by Lionel Thompson and Vladimir Shishkin. So, you can’t count Uzcategui out as a true top five fighter.
Plant has never beaten a top five-level during his career, so it is important for him to fight Mbilli to show that he belongs to the best fighters because he has not shown that he deserves praise for beating tomato milk throughout his 10-year career. It was all smoke and mirrors with Plant.
We saw that former IBF 168-lb champion Plant (23-2, 14 KOs) could handle a non-top five fighter, #8-WBA ranked Trevor McCumby (28-1, 21 KOs) last Saturday night with the his nine-round knockout of the little-known fighter at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.
The fighters Plant wants after are a long way from his galaxy, and he’s been too inactive lately to interest any of them in fighting. The guy Plant picked for his comeback fight last Saturday, McCumby, was a complete unknown. Even hardcore boxing fans had never heard of him.
The ‘Sweethands’ plant should be tried
So, it seemed silly for Plant to call out Canelo Alvarez, Edgar Berlanga and Jermall Charlo after the fight. With a 2-2 record in Plant’s last four fights, and his only wins coming against unknown McCumby and 38-year-old Anthony Dirrell, he hasn’t done enough to get a fight against Canelo, Berlanga or Jermall .
Plant was taken down by McCumby in the fourth and hurt a couple of times in the beginning. The fight could have ended in a KO if McCumby had more of a ring IQ because he looked distraught when Plant made a small adjustment by fighting in close.
Plant needed to take the fight to the inside for him to rally and stop the Illinois native McCumby, who showed that he did not know how to fight inside and was slow to make adjustments to take the contest to the middle of the ring. .
Mbilli is an excellent internal fighter. So if Plant couldn’t handle Mbilli’s outside play, he couldn’t use a plan B of fighting inside like he did against McCumby.
After the fight, which was very difficult for Plant, he called Canelo Alvarez, Edgar Berlanga and Jermall Charlo, saying he wanted one of them later. However, this is likely a pipe dream for Plant, unless the Premier Boxing Champions want to offer one of those three a huge guaranteed purse for a fight that will likely hemorrhage money.
Plant is not a big enough name in the United States to be used to sell a rematch with Canelo, a fight against Berlanga, or a fight against the inactive 34-year-old Jermall Charlo. If PBC tried to sell those contests to the public on PPV, they would be dead on arrival (DOA).
Caleb Plant Wish List
Canelo Alvarez
Edgar Berlanga
Jermall Charlo
“When I was sparring, I caught a lot of guys with left hooks while I was back on the ropes. It was one of my best shots. I was trying to catch him but I couldn’t clean him enough. He adapted well,” he said Trevor McCumby.
