David Benavidez has decided to stop chasing a fight against Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez and move up to light-heavyweight.
The 27-year-old spent years calling out Canelo and, despite also becoming mandatory challenger, never got close to the fight.
With a maiden win at 175 under his belt to pick up the WBC Interim title making him first in line for a shot at the undisputed winner of Artur Beterbiev vs Dmitry Bivol, he has officially informed the sanctioning body that that’s the division he will be campaigning at for the foreseeable.
Speaking to 2ToneDaSupastar, he explained the move.
“I’ve been mandatory for [Canelo] for the past three years. I can’t force a man to fight me, you know what I mean? It shouldn’t even come to a position where you have to activate your mandatory. What is the interim title for? That’s basically activating your mandatory. They got a lot of weird stuff going on over there. At the end of the day I gotta move on with my career and keep trying to win titles.”
Asked if he would consider Anthony Yarde as his second opponent in this light-heavyweight run, Benavidez said yes and revealed when he was targetting his return.
“Yeah, November or December … That’d be a great fight. Yarde would be a good fight. Any of them. Whoever out there right now, I’m just trying to fight whoever, I really don’t care.”
Bivol and Beterbiev face off on October 12 and what happens with the belts thereafter remains to be seen, but a similar situation that recently played out in the heavyweight division – undisputed champ Oleksandr Usyk being forced to vacate the IBF title – may take place. There’s also the distinct possibility that the winner could retire, particularly if it’s 39-year-old Beterbiev.
Benavidez will fight for the WBC belt in the aftermath no matter what and could pick up good experience against the tough two-time world title challenger Yarde, who went eight rounds with Beterbiev last year before being stopped.
He was most recently linked with fellow Brit Joshua Buatsi but subsequently pulled out of talks and is now not seeing eye-to-eye with promoter Frank Warren.
