Will David Morrell Be Too Powerful For Benavidez?

Cuban David Morrell will bring much power and technical skills to his fight against former WBC super middleweight champion David Benavidez on January 25th in Las Vegas.

Benavidez will be facing the biggest puncher of his career by far and a guy with more experience due to his years in the amateurs in his native Cuba.

The ‘Mexican Monster’ Benavidez’s last fight against Oleksandr Gvozdyk on June 15th showed that it’s not a good idea for Morrell to let the fight go to the scorecards against him. That fight looked like a draw or a close win for Benavidez, but he was given a wide 12-round decision.

Unless Morrell wants similar treatment, he must knock out Benavidez on January 25th. Fortunately for Morrell, he has massive punching power and can take the judges out of the picture.

Morrell (11-0, 9 KOs) has the kind of power that Benavidez (29-0, 24 KOs) has never faced before during his 11-year pro career, and he may not hold up under those kinds of shots from the Cuban.

We saw in Benavidez’s debut at 175 against Oleksandr Gvozdyk that his stamina is that of a six-round fighter, and his power failed to carry up from the 168-lb weight class. Benavidez was never a big puncher. The reasons he’s been successful are due to these factors:

1. Weak opposition
2. High punch output
3. Size advantage

Morrell had been calling out Benavidez for the last couple of years but had been ignored by him. Benavidez preferred to face old veterans for obvious reasons. It’s believed the sole reason that Benavidez finally accepted a fight against David Morrell is his less-than-impressive performance against Radivoje “Hot Rod” Kalajdzic on August 3rd.

While the 26-year-old Morrell dominated the former light heavyweight world title challenger Kalajdzic (29-3, 21 KOs), hurting him numerous times, he failed to get the knockout and looked vulnerable.

The scores were 117-111, 117-111, and 118-110 in favor of Morrell. That fight showed that Morrell needs to throw more punches when he stuns his opponents because he had Kalajdzic hurt four times in the contest but let him off the hook by not putting his shots together to finish the job.

Benavidez’s last Four Opponents

– Oleksandr Gvozdyk
– Demetrius Andrade
– Caleb Plant
– David Lemieux