Trainer Stephen Edwards believes David Morrell doesn’t have the ring IQ to beat interim WBC lightweight champion David Benavidez in their fight on February 1.
Stephen believes that “regular” WBA 175-lb champion Morrell (11-0, 9 KOs) relies too much on his power and explosiveness and doesn’t have many tricks he can rely on if that doesn’t work.
Edwards notes that Morel struggled in his Aug. 3 fight against Radivoje Kalajdzic in his 175-weight debut, but was never in danger of losing. Indeed, Morrell dominated every round of the fight, but occasionally took big shots from Hot Rod, who can hit.
This guy has better power than Benavidez and Morrell had to be careful at times. Mostly, he nailed Hot Rod at will with powerful shots and had wounded him several times.
Stephen faced “The Mexican Monster” Benavidez (29-0, 24 KOs) when he defeated Caleb Plant’s fighter last year on March 25, 2023, and it didn’t go well for him. He came away from this fight impressed with Benavidez.
Plant was too weak and small for Benavidez, who looked like a cruiserweight in the ring in this fight,
Morrell vs. Benavidez will headline on February 1st at PBC at Prime Video PPV at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas. This is the first fight in Benavidez’s 11-year career where he has faced someone in a 50-50 matchup who has a chance to beat him.
The closest he ever came to an opponent who had a chance to beat him was in his last fight against Oleksandr Gvozdyk in his debut at 175 on June 15. Benavidez tired early in this fight and was really hammered by Gvozdyk from rounds 7 through 12.
“This is a fight that David Morrell can win, but I don’t know if he will,” Stephen Edwards said. Fighthype for the David Benavidez vs. David Morrell fight on February 1st. “He had issues with ‘Hot Rod,’ but he wasn’t losing.
“There’s a difference when you go back to your corner and you don’t know if you’re up. I have to see how his adjustments are when he doesn’t win the match or when the other one puts mental pressure on him where he starts to create a little doubt.
“I’m very impressed with David Morrell, but he kind of relies on his strength, his strength and his size. He’s too big to wrestle at 168. He’s a big guy. I’m very impressed with him, but a lot of the guys he’s been fighting have been so much smaller than him that he doesn’t need to reach into his bag of tricks to rely on other things like his IQ.
Like Benavidez, Morrell was too big for the 168-lb division, but he doesn’t fight at 175. Both fought smaller fighters at super middleweight. It wasn’t just Morrell who struggled with a lot of younger guys. Benavidez was always bigger than his opponents during the 11 years he fought at 168.
“I’m not saying he doesn’t have it, but I haven’t seen it yet,” Edwarda said of Morrell’s ring IQ. “I will choose David Benavidez. I think his IQ is greatly underestimated. His defense is underrated. People say it’s easy to get hit, but when you fight like a fight, you’re going to get hit when you walk on a man. Plus, he’s a big guy, but he takes a lot of punches.
“He’s very good at hitting you. It can backfire. He is very aware of his defense. He’s not in there to let his head get cut back all over the place. When you see him getting hit, look closely at him. Even when he gets hit, his hands are up. So punches should go through his gloves. He deflects a lot of power,” Edwards said of Benavidez.
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