Despite his great achievements in the sport of boxing, many fans remain frustrated that Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez has never, and likely will never, face David Benavidez.
Alvarez is coming towards the end of his career with perhaps three or four bouts left. The focus, after losing his undisputed super-middleweight title to Terence Crawford last year, is to win belts back at 168lbs.
It means that a long-awaited clash between Canelo and Benavidez is off the table, as the latter currently competes at cruiserweight and will only drop back down as far as light-heavy.
Speaking to Ariel Helwani, Canelo explained that ‘the perfect time’ was when they were both at 168lbs, though Benavidez being a contender rather than champion stopped it from happening.
“He’s a heavyweight fighting at 175, or a cruiserweight. It’s not fair. When I [was] turning undisputed, if he would have been a champion at that point, that was the correct time to do the fight, but he wasn’t. He was fighting at 168 at that point, but he wasn’t a champion. That was, I think, the perfect moment to do it.”
Benavidez previously held the WBC super-middleweight belt twice, but was stripped on both occasions. When Canelo was on his undisputed run, Benavidez fought his way back to mandatory status with the WBC, but the sanctioning body never forced the fight, frustrating the 29-year-old to the point that he decided to move up in weight.
Though Benavidez would still eagerly make the fight at light-heavyweight, a division in which Canelo has competed twice, fans should not hold out much hope.
Instead, Alvarez returns on October 31 to face the new WBC super-middleweight champion, Christian Mbilli, in his first attempt to win back a former belt.
