David Benavidez defeated arch-rival Caleb Plant with championship round violence, before calling out Canelo

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LAS VEGAS — David Benavidez beat, battered, and bloodied super middleweight rival Caleb Plant after an epic 12-round fight Saturday in front of a sold-out raucous crowd at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas.

Plant started the fight well, boxing behind his jab, and trying to confound Benavidez with canny footwork he’s perfected through the years.

But, eventually, he couldn’t escape a bludgeoning that, at times, felt like it was a foregone conclusion as Benavidez — an unrelenting super-human who fought like he was possessed — activated abject violence in the championship rounds to inflict extraordinary damage, and secure a victory via unanimous decision.

“I beat him up real good,” Benavidez told Insider and other reporters backstage, having rearranged Plant’s face little more than an hour earlier.

Benavidez and Plant were born to be rivals

David Benavidez and Caleb Plant always seemed destined for the box office.

Simmering tension throughout fight week in Las Vegas threatened to bubble over as this was a rivalry that included routine trash talk, but also a gym brawl in which Plant appeared to take on Benavidez’s entire team.

This was never your run-of-the-mill animosity in combat sports. The bad blood was always genuine.

David Benavidez and Caleb Plant. Photo by Esther Lin / Showtime

Benavidez once accused the American of being a phony. Plant ribbed his rival for alleged cocaine use from when he tested positive in 2018 for benzoylecgonine — the key ingredient in the drug.

Back then, the WBC stripped Benavidez of the world title he won aged 20, when he broke the record as the youngest super middleweight to win a championship, edging Ronald Gavril by a decision.

“I’m gonna break Caleb Plant’s jaw by the sixth round,” Benavidez told Insider and other reporters at a press conference Thursday. It was like he was always longing to do Plant damage.

Plant, who demolished Anthony Dirrell in a knockout of the year candidate in 2022, went viral when he pretended to dig a grave while celebrating his violent finish.

It was something Plant repeated during a public workout Insider attended Wednesday as if he was, this time, going to bury Benavidez.

“I see Caleb has been doing that grave-digging gesture,” said Benavidez. “But he’s digging his own.”

On Saturday, they got their hands on one another in a squared circle, in front of a sell-out crowd, for the very first time.

It was personal. And, boy, did they fight like it.

Plant started strong but Benavidez grew in stature toward the end of the fight David Benavidez beat Caleb Plant. Photo by Getty Images

With the hatred running so deep, it always seemed like this fight could have been won and lost before the opening bell. Cool heads, in rivalries like these, often prevail.

Benavidez roughed Plant up, shoved him, and fought with spice. Plant, meanwhile, clinched whenever the going got tough, ensuring the referee Kenny Bayless needed no second invitation to inject himself into the bout.

Plant patiently waited for his openings, was accurate with his output, and boxed behind his jab — a punch as offensive as it was defensive in a fight like this.

He was the busier fighter in the first half of the bout, confounded Benavidez with movement, and sought to frustrate him with clean shots and break up his opponent’s spiteful punching by initiating clinches.

Benavidez, by contrast, would throw with such bad intentions it was like he was screaming obscenities with every power punch. Bang — eff you! Whack — and everything you stand for!

While Plant’s boxing got him through the first half of the fight, his guard was looser in the second half just as Benavidez showed there were levels to his engine.

The Arizona slugger’s violence became more pronounced toward the championship rounds, culminating with such brutal shots — mostly left hooks to both the body and the jaw — that it begged questions as to how Plant was still standing, and whether his coach Stephen ‘Breadman’ Edwards would withdraw him from the contest.

In the 10th round it became clear the ring was Benavidez’s world, Plant was just living in it, and there was nothing anybody could do to prevent the undefeated fighter from claiming yet another victory.

He threw a fight-high 85 punches in the 10th, according to Compubox data sent to Insider, and continued to out-punch Plant in the 11th and 12th rounds.

David Benavidez. Photo by Esther Lin / Showtime

When it mattered most — the rounds to close the show and put a punctuation mark on the performance — Benavidez only grew stronger, and earned his win with scores of 115-113, 116-112, and a somewhat wide 117-111, according to the three ringside judges.

“I know there was a lot said between us but in the end we settled this like men,” said Benavidez after the fight, deciding to bury the rivalry rather than Plant himself.

“He’s a helluva fighter. I’m happy we gave the fans the best rivalry of the last five years.”

The majority of Benavidez’s shots were significant as he connected with 180 power punches from 419 thrown, limiting Plant, meanwhile, to 68 from 377.

Benavidez continued: “I think I was catching him with a lot of power shots, and that’s why I’m called the Mexican Monster, because I keep coming like a monster.”

He closed by commenting on a fight he’s been campaigning for, against the former pound-for-pound No.1 boxer Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez.

“I just want to tell everyone that I have a lot of respect for Canelo but he has to give me that shot now,” said Benavidez. “That’s what everyone wants to see. Let’s make it happen.

“I don’t think Canelo is trying to avoid me. I just feel like he has a lot of options. But now the fans are calling for this fight.”

Jesus Ramos stuns Joseph Spencer Jesus Ramos and Joey Spencer. Photo by Esther Lin / Showtime

Boxing contender Jesus Ramos continued his ascendancy to the top at super welterweight as the hulking Arizonan bullied his way past Joey Spencer who, pre-fight, was touted as a solid test for the 22-year-old.

Ramos has numerous things going for him and one of which is obvious — he’s huge for his weight class and could well be an expert weight-cutter in the mold of Conor McGregor at featherweight, Adrien Broner at super featherweight, and Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. at middleweight.

When you look at the stocky and powerfully-framed Ramos, it looks like he has no right competing at 154 pounds. But it’s a division he seemingly has no issue making and it allows him to bulldoze his way through opponents in style.

After shifting weight onto his back foot, Ramos threw his signature shot — a left hook — and cracked it flush on Spencer’s jaw, dropping him to the floor in the very first round.

Joey Spencer gets up from the canvas in fight against Jesus Ramos. Photo by Esther Lin / Showtime

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Ramos continued to dominate the fight, said later that he got “carried away” with his own power seeking the finish, but eventually forced a corner stoppage in the seventh round to advance his pro record to 20 wins (16 knockouts).

“Ever since the knockdown I was looking for that punch for two or three rounds and my dad told me to box him behind the jab,” said Ramos.

“I started doing that more and I started to land more shots and started to do better and follow the game plan.”

Colbert escaped Las Vegas with a lucky win Chris Colbert and Jose Valenzuela. Photo by Esther Lin / Showtime

Earlier in the show, there was a baptism of fire for Chris Colbert who hoped to rebound from last year’s shock defeat to Hector Luis Garcia by beating crowd favorite Jose Valenzuela.

However, Valenzuela let Colbert what kind of night it would be for the fighter who had been confidently chirping all week by dropping the New Yorker with a counter hook shot in the opening round.

The knockdown wasn’t the only time Valenzuela got the crowd on their fight as his venomous flurries, in which he targeted the body and head, showed he had far more pop in his shots than anything Colbert could muster.

Competing in a new weight class at 135 pounds, particularly when he was coming off a defeat, was proving to be an insurmountable task for Colbert who got taught there’s a difference between men and boys in 10-round bouts at an unfamiliar weight.

There were moments of success for Colbert who jabbed well and showed, at times, great boxing acumen.

What he had in skill could not offset what Velanzuela had in physicality and experience at the weight.

Regardless, the ringside judges saw a completely different fight to Insider and other reporters on press row as they unanimously awarded Colbert with three offensive scores of 95-94.

Jose Valenzuela and Chris Colbert. Photo by Esther Lin / Showtime

The result enraged the pro-Valenzuela crowd who booed the decision so much it was near-impossible to hear what was being said in the ring during the post-fight speeches.

Las Vegas has been plagued by casino heists in recent months with a few arrests made from separate holdups at the cages, where tens of thousands of dollars are kept at any one time to accommodate the whims of gamblers.

As Valenzuela was denied what should have been a straightforward win, Colbert — who told Valenzuela he was “a sore loser” — becomes the latest person to leave the strip after a robbery inside one of the city’s resorts.