Physical Address
304 North Cardinal St.
Dorchester Center, MA 02124
Dan Rafael believes interim WBC super middleweight champion David Benavidez has the upper hand in his battle against WBA “regular” champion David Morrell on February 1st.
Reporter Rafael believes that Benavidez (29-0, 24 KOs) has the better chin and punching power than Cuba’s Morrell (11-0, 9 KOs) in this matchup, which can be seen live on PBC on Prime Video PPV. from the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.
Experience factor
“I would lean toward Benavidez. I wouldn’t say by pedigree because David Morrell has this deep amateur background in the Cuban system,” Dan Rafael told Social Boxing about the David Benavidez vs. David Morrell fight on February 1st.
“Both are in their prime for their age, although David Morrell has fewer fights because he started late. He left Cuba and moved very quickly in the early days of his career. But he didn’t need to have 1000 fights because he had all that amateur experience, while Benavidez turned pro at 17. It was more of a work in progress to get to this point.
“When you look at the records and you see one guy’s had less than 15 fights and another guy’s had 30 fights, you’re thinking that guy’s a lot bigger and a lot more experienced. That’s not the case. They’re both a lot more close in age and experience, Morrell’s fans make up for it, while Benavidez has more professional experience.”
Morrell has more experience in the sport than Benavidez, who has gone 148 rounds as a pro during his 12-year career.
Morrell has 54 rounds, but was 130-2 as an amateur in Cuba and has more overall rounds against better opposition than Benavidez has fought as a pro. Benavidez has fought limited, mostly older fighters like Gvozdyk, 36-year-old Demetrius Andrade, David Lemieux and Caleb Plant.
Chin and power
“I’m leaning towards Benavidez because the combination of chin and power might be a little better than Morrell,” Rafael said.
Morrell, 26, is the youngest fighter by a little over a year and has never been hurt. It’s hard to say for sure if Benavidez has the better chin or not when Morrell has never been hurt. In terms of power, Morrell is the best puncher by far. Rafael is off on this too.
Benavidez is more of a volume puncher who throws a lot of arm punches. All 24 of The Mexican Monster’s knockouts came when he was fighting below his natural weight class at 168, and had a huge size advantage over his opponents.
When he moved up to 175 in his last fight after 11 years as a pro, his power wasn’t the same, and he was never a threat to knock out his opponent Oleksandr Gvozdyk on June 15 of last year.
“I don’t have proof of that because it’s not like Morrell has been hit, knocked out or seriously hurt. I feel like in a shootout, the guy who can get a little better is Benavidez. But we’ll see. That’s why he’s a 50-50 fight,” Rafael said.
