Demetrius Andrade took to social media after his loss last night to let his fans know that he’ll “reload” and return from his setback against David Benavidez (28-0, 24 KOs) after getting stopped in the sixth round at the Michelob Ultra Arena in Las Vegas.
Andrade isn’t saying whether he’ll move back down in weight to 160 or 154, but he probably should go in that career direction because he has no opportunities at 168 any longer.
What was missing from Demetrius was a Kamakazi-style attack on Benavidez early on that would have given him a shot, knocking him out or draining him to the extent that he’d be vulnerable later on.
When you’ve got a fighter like Benavidez draining down 20+ lbs, you must push an ultra-fast pace early to force him to expend energy, given that he’s already putting his body through hell, shifting that much water back into his system overnight after the weigh-in.
Staying at 168 would be a dead-end for Demetrius, as he’ll be ignored permanently by Caleb Plant, Jermall Charlo, and Canelo Alvarez.
The loss to Benavidez finishes any hopes, slim as they were, of ‘Boo Boo’ Andrade getting a shot at fighting Canelo to make life-changing dough.
If Andrade moves back down to 154, he can potentially fight Tim Tszyu, Errol Spence, or Terence Crawford. The 154-lb division could heat up, given that welterweights are moving up.
Whatever chance the 35-year-old former two-division world champion Andrade had, he threw it away by choosing to go to war with hulking 6’2″ Benavidez. It’s unclear if that was Andrade’s game plan to trade with Benavidez or if let his pride take over.
Whatever made Demetrius fight that was, it was a foolish decision. You don’t fight like that against a fighter as huge as Benavidez unless you’ve got massive power and young like David Morrell or Artur Beterbiev. Those are two guys that Benavidez has never shown much interest in fighting, and you can guess why.
Andrade (32-1, 19 KOs) was too small to get the job done against the Benavidez and had to be pulled out of the fight after soaking up a ton of punishment through six punishing rounds.
Andrade determined to “rise again”
“I appreciate the opportunity to engage in a challenging battle. Every fight, win or lose, fuels my love for the sport of boxing, and I’m determined to rise again,” said Demetrius Andrade on Instagram following his sixth round stoppage loss to David Benavidez.
“A special thank you to Showtime Boxing, Premierboxing, and Benavidez for the experience. Now, it’s time to reload, stay motivated, and prepare for the next battle. 🇨🇻#itsmeagain🇺🇸 📸”
Benavidez was nice enough to give Andrade the chance to fight him, as the slick Rhode Island southpaw had been avoided through most of his fifteen-year professional career by the big names after coming out of the 2008 Olympics.
Hopefully, Andrade got a big payday out of the fight because his chances for future well-paying fights will be slim unless he moves back down to 154. The 160-lb division is a barren, lifeless void with no one for Demetrius to fight that will bring him any kind of money.
Demetrius can extend his career at 154
The real question is whether Andrade can melt down to 154 without draining himself to collapse, as he’d had to take off a lot of weight in the same way Benavidez does, melting down from cruiserweight.
With a big size advantage over his opposition at 154, Andrade can stay around longer by dominating his smaller foes the way Benavidez does at 168.
“He was outgunned tonight, and it wasn’t just size. Benavidez was skillful and had a great game plan. It was thought that a southpaw and slick guy might give him trouble. Not the case,” said Chris Algieri to ProBox TV, reacting to David Benavidez’s blowout win over Demetrius Andrade last Saturday night.
Of course, the size advantage allowed Benavidez to dominate Andrade the way he did. What is Algieri talking about? If they were the same size, Benavidez wouldn’t have been able to pummel Andrade the way he did.
If size wasn’t so crucial for the 26-year-old Benavidez, he’d have moved up to light heavyweight ages ago because the guy is devoting vast amounts of training camp time to weight management to help him stay at 168 for as long as possible to dominate his smaller opposition.
“The hand speed was there, the jab was there, cutting off the ring has massively improved [for Benavidez] since the Caleb Plant fight, which I thought was a really big and important thing that needed to be worked on by camp Benavidez,” said Algieri.
Benavidez is no different than he was in his previous fight against Caleb Plant. He’s not gotten faster, and it’s silly to think he’s picked up speed. The only noticeable difference was Benavidez’s extra weight for this fight.
He was clearly heavier for the Andrade fight than for the match against Plant, which helped his power. It would have been nice if Showtime had provided the rehydrated weights for the fight like HBO used to do, as that way, boxing fans would see how heavy Benavidez was when he stepped into the ring.
Benavidez looked like he weighed well into the 190s, and that was obviously too much weight for Andrade to tangle with, as he appeared to look the same as he had at the weigh-in last Friday.
“They had a guy [Andrade] that was moving, he was slick, he was throwing big shots. Great body work early on, but it just wasn’t enough,” said Algieri about Andrade.
“David Benavidez was stellar tonight. The guy is something special, and he’s going to be around for a long time. I’m blown away. I thought this was going to be a competitive fight, I thought I was going to be a good fight. I thought there was going to be back & forth moments. There wasn’t. Benavidez is the truth,” said Algieri.
“I expected for Andrade to have an early advantage, and then for Benavidez to come on strong and get him out of there by round nine. It didn’t even go that long,” said Paulie Malignaggi.
