Morrell vows to “make it look easy” against Benavidez

David Morrell says he will make it look “easy” to beat David Benavidez in their 12-round light heavyweight headliner two weeks from today on February 1.

WBA ‘ordinary’ light heavyweight champion Morrell (11-0, 9 KOs) sees Benavidez as just a simple, “Fat” push fighter who walks forward and throws punches, but no “power” in his punches. He says he knows he’s stronger than Benavidez (29-0, 24 KOs), which goes without saying.

Benavidez’s lack of power

‘The Mexican monster’ lacks power. He is a volume puncher who flourished during the first 11 years of his career when, at 168, he was a big fish in a small pond.

Like many younger fighters, Benavidez may water down to fight in a division well below his body size. Early in his career, we saw the same thing with Julio Cesar Chavez Jr.

Now that Benavidez is at 175, his advantage is gone, his lack of punching power even more of a liability, and he no longer has the size to fall back on. He is now fighting a guy just his size, Morrell, but with superior skills and talent, a true knockout artist. It’s not looking good for Benavidez.

Morrell: Make it “look easy”

“Benavidez is not easy, but I’m going to make it look easy. They are two different things,” Morrell told the Gloves off episode 2. “Every time you come to the gym, work, work, work. It’s better to cry here than cry inside the ring during the fight.

“That’s the problem in this fight. Me and him too, we’re both guys that like to push,” Morrell said of the constant pressure Benavidez applied to his last opponent, Oleksandr Gvozdyk, in his debut at 175 last June 15 in Las Vegas. “Both guys like to come forward and push. Who is stronger? I know it’s me.

“Everyone says in his last fight he really didn’t have the strength to knock some people out. He has nothing. That’s my real weight, 175,” Morrell said. At the moment I feel comfortable with this weight.”

Frame-wise, Benavidez is a light heavyweight and has been his entire career, but his power is more like a middleweight (160 lbs), and he gets hit a lot more than he did when he fought at 168. In Benavidez’s debut at 175 against former WBC light heavyweight champion Oleksandr Gvozdyk, he has a career-high penalty in that bout.

Life is going to be very different for Benavidez at 175. He will be fighting killers like Morrell and facing opposition for the first time in his long professional career. As a 12-year pro, Benavidez is like a prospect, stepping up for the first time but not physically young.

Body betrayal

Benavidez’s body has seen the wear and tear of a fighter who has been in the game for over a decade. All the wars in sparring wore him down further. We’re seeing the consequences now, with Benavidez breaking down with injuries left and right in his last fight.

It’s the wear of a long career rearing its ugly head. He’s like an old car with 300,000 miles on the odometer. Yes, you shine the car up, but it’s still an old car engine and transmission wise. That’s how it is with Benavidez. Lots of miles on him.

“I really believe I’m seeing a legend. He reminds me so much of a guy like Evander Holyfield, of a guy like Pernell Whitaker,” coach Ronnie Shields said of Morrell. “The reason he reminds me of those guys is because of the way he works.

“I give Benavidez credit for stepping in with him. He didn’t have to. It just goes to show you have fighters out there who want to fight the best. So, now he’s getting an opportunity,” Shields said.

Finally step on

You have to give Benavidez credit for FINALLY stepping up in his twelfth year as a pro to take on Morrell after being called out by him for two solid years. Benavidez had a very long career, and, surprisingly, it took him this long to start taking on the elite level fighters rather than old, toothless, smaller guys that he built his entire 29-0 record on.

There is a formula in this era of boxing where fighters create plastic records by fighting scrubs and then bragging themselves to try and get a big cash payday. Is Benavidez one of them?

He fought the same kind of guys as Edgar Berlanga, and it’s hard not to put ‘The Mexican Monster’ in the same category. As the saying goes: ‘You are what you eat.’ It’s going well in the pro game produced fighters creating unbeaten records built 100% on knocking tomato cans.

Fighting exclusively lower-level opposition, Benavidez has been a pro for nearly 15 years. How do you not fight quality opposition, especially with a massive size advantage over everyone else?

“What I see in Morrell is a lot of mistakes that I can take advantage of,” Benavidez said. “He says he’s a better fighter than me because he’s from Cuba and he trained with Cubans, but that doesn’t mean anything. I grew up with monsters.

Both fighters have faced plenty of good opposition in their careers, but Benavidez shouldn’t see this as some sort of honor or war medal to pin on his chest. All fighters do this. Benavidez even mentions it as a sign of insecurity. The flaws Benavidez sees in Morrell exist in his own game.

He is project his weaknesses on Morrell and fails to recognize he is now even more vulnerable than he was when he drained fighting smaller, older fighters at 168 to game the system. Benavidez is now starting to break down physically due to his long career in the game.