{"id":803477,"date":"2026-10-15T14:48:09","date_gmt":"2026-10-15T14:48:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/803477\/"},"modified":"2026-10-15T14:48:09","modified_gmt":"2026-10-15T14:48:09","slug":"tony-bellew-sums-up-david-benavidezs-chances-of-success-at-heavyweight","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/803477\/","title":{"rendered":"Tony Bellew sums up David Benavidez’s chances of success at heavyweight"},"content":{"rendered":"

Tony Bellew has assessed whether David Benavidez has the power and relentlessness to beat, or even knock out, any of the world\u2019s leading heavyweights.<\/p>\n

The Mexican-American made his cruiserweight debut in May, dethroning Gilberto Ramirez with a vicious sixth-round finish<\/a> for the WBO and WBA titles.<\/p>\n

In doing so, he became a three-division world champion and proved that, even at 200lbs, he possesses the speed and power to ruthlessly dispatch a top-level operator.<\/p>\n

Talk has therefore progressed beyond the confines of a cruiserweight title reign, with Benavidez having promised an eventual appearance in the land of the giants.<\/p>\n

Already, the 29-year-old has mentioned Oleksandr Usyk as a potential opponent<\/a> while, according to his father, Jose Benavidez Sr, a clash with Andy Ruiz Jr could also be explored down the line.<\/p>\n

Either way, \u2018The Mexican Monster\u2019 would join an exclusive group, including Roy Jones Jr and James Toney, of super-middleweight champions that moved up to heavyweight.<\/p>\n

And according to Bellew, who campaigned at 175lbs before joining the big boys, Benavidez could cause many heavyweights problems with his work rate alone.<\/p>\n

He may not have the power or strength to stop them, but Bellew has told Fight Your Corner<\/a> that Benavidez could certainly find success across the 12-round distance.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think David\u2019s ever going to stop any of the heavyweights, but he\u2019s going to outwork an awful lot of them.\u201d<\/p>\n

As for his immediate future, Benavidez is expected to enter a unification match with WBC champion Michal Cieslak in December, before targeting a Jai Opetaia fight for Cinco de Mayo weekend in 2027.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tony Bellew has assessed whether David Benavidez has the power and relentlessness to beat, or even knock out,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":803478,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[2560,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-803477","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-boxing","tag-boxing","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/803477","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=803477"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/803477\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/803478"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=803477"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=803477"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=803477"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}