By Dan Ambrose: Tonight, David Benavidez (25-0, 22 KOs) will be looking to grab the critical interim WBC super-middleweight title in his 12-round headliner fight against David Lemieux (43-4, 36 KOs) at the Gila River Arena in Glendale, Arizona.
Benavidez vs. Lemieux will be shown live on Showtime at 10:00 p.m. ET.
Although the 33-year-old Lemieux is still a huge puncher, he’s got a lot of miles on him, and his chances of winning tonight come down to whether he can land one of his big hooks on the chin of Benavidez.
Benavidez was stunned in his last two fights against Kyrone Davis and Ronald Ellis, but neither guy had enough pop to finish the job.
Lemieux has the power to finish Benavidez if he gets him hurt, but he’ll need to get to his chin early. With Benavidez’s heavy hands and machine gun combination punching, he will likely finish Lemieux well before the sixth round tonight.
The WBC interim 168-lb will help Benavidez box reluctant champion Canelo Alvarez into fighting him or vacating his strap.
It’s already undeniable that Canelo wants no part of fighting the dangerous young lion Benavidez (25-0, 22 KOs), but he’s been able to swerve him up until now.
Prediction:
Benavidez will hurt Lemieux with one of his heavy hands early and then flurry on him to get a stoppage tonight. This writer sees Benavidez stopping the 33-year-old Lemieux by the fourth round.
There’s too much youth, size, and power that Benavidez has going for him in this encounter. Lemieux has always been a lower B-level fighter, even in his prime, but he’s well past it in his 15-year professional career.
The way that Lemieux’s speech has changed in recent years it’s troubling. Lemieux is still fighting as he’d done in the past, but his opposition has been poor.
“Everything you see, I see. It’s not really hard to predict what he’s going to do. He’s either looking for a big left hook or a big right hook,” said David Benavidez to Fight Hub TV about his fight tonight against the big puncher David Lemieux in Glendale, Arizona.
“That’s why we put a good game plan together. We worked on it during the whole camp, so it’s time to put it in play on Saturday,” continued Benavidez.
“No, I don’t want it to make it to the twelfth round. I definitely want to stop him. If it goes to the 12th round, then that’s when it has to be, but I want to go in there and continue my knockout streak.
“I want to keep my KO ratio where it’s at and keep trying to stop everybody, every single person I can stop if possible. There’s no reason why I can’t do that. I’ve trained really well, my stamina is really well, and my power is really well.
“Everything is amazing. It’s going to be a really good performance on my end,” said Benavidez.
