Benavidez Puts On A Monstrous Performance Versus Andrade

This past Saturday from the Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas, David “The Monster” Benavidez, stayed true to his name as he exhausted Demetrius Andrade who could no longer escape his relentless offensive attack, forcing Andrade to retire on his stool just before the 7th round.

It was supposed to be a clash between two fighters with very different styles, but similar stories. Benavidez, the determined two-fisted pressure fighter with abnormal size for a 168 pounder, had trouble securing fights with the high profile names of the middleweight and super middleweight divisions. He was expected to have trouble with the quirky, but effective, counter punching slickness of Andrade who has won interim titles at 154 and 160 pounds, but also has been unable to entice the bigger names to face him. 

And early on Andrade did have his moments, if only for the first two rounds. Andrade began the fight aggressively, pushing Benavidez back at times—a rare sight to behold—and landing overhand lefts and uppercuts.

But Benavidez did what he always does. He took the incoming, catching punches on his gloves and forearms, then absorbing the shots that managed to pass his guard and kept marching forward behind quick jabs and straight right hands. What was not expected, however, was that Andrade’s quick start seemed to slow him down by the end of the third round. This proved to be a very scary situation with Benavidez just getting warmed up.

Benavidez capitalized on Andrade’s fatigue, landing more and more clean punches as Andrade began to wilt under “The Monster’s” constant pressure. The tide officially turned when Benavidez feinted a right hand to the body then threw a looping right hand to the top of Andrade’s head, just above his guard, dropping him with two seconds left in the fourth. Andrade survived the round, but was visibly shaken as he walked back to his corner. It was the third time Andrade had been dropped in his career, but he had never been in this much trouble in a fight before.

Rounds 5 and 6 would be Benavidez’s most successful rounds as he raised his punch count, more than doubling the number of punches landed in round 4 (40 in round 5 & 38 in round 6). Andrade tried to avoid Benavidez, circling his opponent as much as his 35 year old legs would allow, but he could not sustain the pace being set by “El Monstruo.” Like a predator sensing a wounded animal, Benavidez turned up the aggression with more straight rights and vicious hooks to Andrade’s body.

With 50 seconds left to go in round 6, Andrade would give one last valiant effort throwing an 8 punch combination, landing a thudding left and right uppercut to the head of Benavidez, Benavidez, who appeared to be slightly stunned. Andrade would follow with a two punch combination to the body and another to the head, but could not follow it up with anything else. Benavidez continued to maul Andrade as the round closed, knocking his mouthpiece out for the second time in the fight. The end would come after the 6th round as the referee walked to Andrade’s corner in between rounds and was told to stop the fight.

The build up to this fight set Benavidez up as the only fighter willing to take on the risky challenge of the man known as “Boo Boo.” But what became apparent very early on was that Andrade waited too long to step up for what was in all fairness the first risky fight of his career. 

Andrade plans to fight on, saying after the fight that he will “work on his body” as he goes back to the drawing board. As for Benavidez, predictably, the topic of a fight with Canelo Alvarez was brought up and Benavidez left it to the crowd asking, “Do you guys want to see Benavidez versus Canelo?” An enthusiastic roar could be heard to which Benavidez responded with a smile, “That says enough on its own, right there.”