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A long-awaited grudge match Is finally within reach.
BoxingScene.com has learned that the respective camps for David Benavidez and Caleb Plant are in talks for an interim WBC super middleweight eyed for the first half of 2023. Both camps were eager to get ahead of the curve, as the fight is expected to be ordered during the ratings portion of the annual WBC convention due to take place November 6-11 in Acapulco, Mexico.
The fight is expected to be next for both boxers, despite prior talks of Benavidez taking a stay-busy fight.
Phoenix’s Benavidez currently holds the interim WBC super middleweight title, while Plant is effectively his mandatory challenger as the sanctioning body’s number-one contender.
Benavidez won in a third-round knockout of David Lemieux on May 21 in Glendale, Arizona. The win was supposed to ensure a mandatory shot at undisputed lineal/WBA/WBC/IBF/WBO champ Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez (58-2-2, 39KOs) but the fight has yet to be ordered by the WBC. Alvarez has also stated the likelihood of not fighting until next September after undergoing surgery to tend to a lingering injury.
There were talks of Benavidez (26-0, 23KOs)—a former two-time full WBC super middleweight champ—taking a stay-busy fight against one-time scheduled rival Jose Uzcategui. The two were due to meet last November 13 in Phoenix, but Uzcategui tested positive for Recombinant erythropoietin (EPO) which resulted in his immediately being removed from the event.
BoxingScene.com has learned that talks for such a fight is no longer in play, as first reported by ESPN.com boxing insider Mike Coppinger. The matchup never made sense, as Uzcategui is unranked by the WBC, has yet to enter the WBC’s Clean Boxing Program or any random drug testing protocol to prove that he’s a clean fighter.
A fight with Plant (22-1, 13KOs) makes far more sense.
Plant cemented his place as the number-one contender with the WBC following a sensational ninth-round knockout of former WBC titlist Anthony Dirrell. The October 15 win remains a leading contender for 2022 Knockout of Year, while also producing Plant’s first win since ending his IBF title reign after nearly three years following an eleventh-round knockout loss to Alvarez in their four-belt unification clash last November 6 in Las Vegas.
The win over Dirrell served as a WBC title eliminator, though it wasn’t immediately made clear whether the winner would become the mandatory challenger for Benavidez’s interim title or Alvarez’s full WBC belt.
Alvarez informed all four sanctioning bodies of an injury aggravated in his win over Gennadiy Golovkin in their September 17 trilogy clash which will keep him out of the ring until at least next May if not longer. With that in mind, the next logical step would be for the WBC to order Benavidez-Plant, with the winner to be assured either a direct shot at Alvarez or an upgrade to full WBC champ should Alvarez refuse the title consolidation clash.
The Benavidez-Plant pairing comes with years-long history. The two camps and the boxers themselves have exchanged plenty of words, with the rivalry also including a brief physical altercation at some point in 2018 prior to Plant’s January 2019 IBF title win over Uzcategui.
Another discussed option for Benavidez was possibly facing David Morrell in a rare unification bout between secondary titlists. Morrell (7-0, 6KOs) holds the WBA ‘World’ (Regular) super middleweight title, which he defends against Kazakhstan’s Aidos Yerbossynuly this Saturday at The Armory in Minneapolis.
Jake Donovan is a senior writer for BoxingScene.com. Twitter: @JakeNDaBox