“Regular” WBC lightweight champion David Morrell has confirmed on social media that he is in talks for a bout against WBC interim champion David Benavidez.
If the two newly undefeated 175-pounders, Morrell (11-0, 9 KOs) and Benavidez (29-0, 24 KOs), agree to a deal, the bout could happen in December. That will put the winner in the slot to fight for the undisputed championship in 2025 against the winner of the October 12 contest between Artur Beterbiev and Dmitry Bivol.
Morrell, 26, is the younger, more powerful and technically gifted fighter than Benavidez, but lacks the experience he possesses. If Cuban Morrell adjusts his game to improve his low punch output, Benavidez will likely lose this fight by KO. The power difference between Morrell and Benavidez is huge. I guess Benavidez didn’t eat his Wheaties growing up.
Although Morrell only has 11 fights as a professional, he has a lot of experience as an amateur in Cuba, which puts him past Benavidez. He has fought far superior fighters in the amateurs than the opposition that Benavidez has fought in the pros, which are mostly seniors like Demetrius Andrade and Anthony Dirrell.
Morrell is a much better puncher than him and has a style better suited to the 175lb division. Benavidez, 27, is a fish out of water at heavyweight and is no longer the fearsome puncher he was at 168, where he had a size advantage over his smaller prey.
If Benavidez loses to Morrell, it will confirm in the minds of fans that he was still only one weight bully from day one. It would be seen as another example of a young fighter playing the system by fighting in a weight class below his size.
Benavidez is a longer professional game, and has beaten Oleksandr Gvozdyk, Demetrius Andrade, Caleb Plant, David Lemieux and Anthony Dirrell.
Benavidez’s high volume offense could give Morrell problems because he throws a lot of punches in a machine gun style, overwhelming his opponents with strikes. In Benavidez’s debut at 175 last June against Gvozdyk, he overwhelmed him with his volume.
Gvozdyk was the bigger puncher and landed the cleaner shots in each round, but Benavidez’s high output was enough to get the win.
Morrell punches a lot harder than Benavidez, but he may have problems with his volume if he doesn’t improve that part of his game by the time the fight is over. That’s what was missing from Morrell in his recent fight against
Radivoje Kalajdzic on August 3 on the undercard of Terence Crawford vs. Israil Madrimov at BMO Stadium in Los Angeles. Morrell had former Artur Beterbiev knockout victim Kalajdzic hurt multiple times in their 12-round fight, but he couldn’t pull away because he was focused on throwing single punches instead of unloading a flurry of shots the way Benavidez had done .
If Morrell had more experience and adjusted his game, he would have easily taken out Kalajdzic because he was early and often in that fight.
The shots that Morrell took seemed harder than the shots that knockout artist Beterbiev had hit him five years earlier in their 2019 bout. The difference was that Beterbiev didn’t back down and let go once had Kalajdzic in trouble. way Morrell did.
A Morrell win in this fight will likely put a big smile on Canelo Alvarez’s face, as he has been hounded by Benavidez non-stop for the past few years. Benavidez pushed like crazy, trying to fight him off, seeming fixated at times on landing that big payday.
What would be really funny is that Morrell was the one who ended the fight against Canelo instead of Benavidez. Now, that would be funny, and it suggests that karma is at work. Morrell didn’t knock Canelo out like Benavidez did.
