A thin, starved-looking David Benavidez weighed in surprisingly at 167 lbs, whereas his healthier-looking opponent, Demetrius Andrade, came in heavier at 167.6 lbs during today’s weigh-in for their twelve round clash in the man event this Saturday night, November 25th.
The 26-year-old Benavidez (27-0, 23 KOs) looked almost unrecognizable to the fighter he’d been before he started his weight cut for his title defense of his WBC interim super middleweight belt weeks ago.
This is by far the worst that Benavidez ever looked, making weight for a fight in Chris Williams’s view.
Undercard weights:
Jermall Charlo 166.4 vs. José Benavídez Jr. 161.2
Subriel Matías 139.8 vs. Shohjahon Ergashev 139.8
Héctor Garcia 129.4 vs. Lamont Roach 129.6
Did Benavidez overdo it with the weight?
Andrade could teach Benavidez an important lesson not to stay in a weight class that his body doesn’t support for too long. It’s one thing for Benavidez to drain himself to a stick figure to feast on weaker opposition, like the ones he’d been facing, but it’s a different story when you’re killing yourself to make weight to face a talent like Andrade (32-0, 19 KOs).
While Benavidez’s boxing fans are celebrating him coming in lower than Andrade, saying this is proof that he belongs at 168, you only have to take one good hard look at the Mexican Monster’s appearance to know that this guy is killing himself to artificially stay in this weight class.
Benavidez looked like a zombie today, and Chris Williams was worried about the emaciated fighter. He looked like he hadn’t eaten in weeks or had any water. It’s obvious that Benavidez is putting himself through hell, hoping to get the payday fight Canelo Alvarez next May.
Hopefully, he doesn’t live to regret it on Saturday night because Andrade has too much talent for Benavidez to be fighting in a weight-drained state, firing only a couple of cylinders.
“I think he’s going to be really surprised how strong I really am,” said Demetrius Andrade to Fight Hub TV about his fight with David Benavidez on Saturday night.
“I work on everything. Inside, outside, upstairs, downstairs,” continued Andrade. “The things that I can do, the things that I can see, and the traps I can do is going to be a good thing for you guys to see.
“I haven’t had that opportunity to fight somebody that is going to bring that type of excitement to me to fight like that. Now, it’s time for me to fight in that way.
“Now, it’s about me getting a chance to become a three-division world champion, and people will get a glimpse to see that road. I don’t know how much longer I’m going to be in the sport of boxing.
“Of course, now is the moment. I tell people, ‘If the s*** is right, you got to take the gamble. No risk, no story. Go ahead. Sometimes, you got to do that.’ Sometimes, you got to be patience, and something you got to step on the brakes. Right now, it’s time to step on the gas.
“It’s not just time, but nobody wants to fight. So, we were able to get David Benavidez to agree to this fight. Other than that, if we didn’t say, ‘Yes,’ we wouldn’t be fighting. We probably would have fought one time this year [against Demond Nicholson last January].
“This is the biggest fight that could be made at 168 lbs. Canelo definitely is the next step in the sense because he’s the cash cow, he’s the most popular, but not because he’s better than David or I. Of course,” said Demetrius about Canelo not having been willing to challenge himself by fighting Benavidez and Andrade.