Canelo missed the cleanest selling point David Benavidez could have made. Benavidez didn’t just beat Gilberto Ramirez on the Cinco de Mayo card. He stopped him in six rounds, captured the WBO and WBA cruiserweight titles and gave himself fresh ammunition in a rivalry that Canelo Alvarez still refuses to enter.
Canelo was in the arena earlier in the evening watching Jaime Munguia win the WBA super middleweight title in the co-feature. Munguia recently joined Team Canelo and Eddy Reynoso, so Alvarez had a clear reason to be there. The harder part to ignore is that he left before Benavidez put on the kind of performance that keeps the age-old question alive.
Benavidez used that exit exactly how most people expected him to.
“It was a shame Canelo couldn’t watch that fight because I think I might have scared him away,” Benavidez said. The Ariel Helwani Show. “I’m a bad guy, man. I’m a bad mother****a.”
This is Benavidez at his most direct. He has been chasing Canelo for years, and Alvarez has shown no interest in giving him the fight. Knocking out Ramirez won’t force Canelo into anything, but it gives Benavidez another public argument to make.
The problem for Canelo is optics. Leaving before Benavidez’s fight gave him control over where he was seen, but it also gave Benavidez a ready-made line. If Canelo never wanted the fight before, seeing Benavidez destroy Ramirez probably wouldn’t change that.
Still, Benavidez now has a bigger belt collection, a cleaner talking point, and another reason to say Canelo wants no part of him. It could be the whole game at this point.
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Last updated on 2026/05/06 at 17:11
