If fans weren’t fired up about the March 25 super middleweight battle between Caleb Plant and David Benavidez, Thursday’s kickoff press conference showed that they should be.
The high-tension presser kicked off fairly diplomatically, despite some outside-the-venue static involving the respective teams and a long history of antagonism between the two fighters.
“We’ve got a big fight on our hands,” Plant began as the first of the fighters to speak at the podium. “But that’s good, that’s what boxing needs, is big fights, and I want to be someone to deliver that to the boxing world. I’m sure he does too. Coming off an 11-month layoff after the Canelo fight, I could’ve chose somebody to get in the ring with, a nobody, just some sparring session of a match, but I told my team I want to make the biggest fight possible…
“They came back to me with two-time former world champ, Anthony Dirrell, and he was ranked high enough in the WBC to make that a 12-round WBC title eliminator. And (Benavidez) being the interim champ and that being a title eliminator means I fight him, we get it on next.”
Then, the former IBF champ ignited the spark that would set off the powder keg, referencing Benavidez’s battles with the scale and previous positive test for cocaine.
“I’m exactly where I want to be,” Plant said. “I’m in the fight that I want…March 25th, you don’t got to worry about me pulling out. I’m gonna show up…and when I show up, I show up on weight, and I don’t test positive for cocaine neither.”
After some nasty words from Benavidez as well as Benavidez’s father and trainer, Jose Benavidez Jr., the former two-time WBC super middleweight champ made his words clear.
“You’ve been knocked the f**k out by Canelo already,” Benavidez told Plant. “You’re going to sleep. That’s exactly what I’m going to do to you. At the highest level, you’re like a b**tch. You got thirteen knockouts. You hit like a little b**ch.
“Ask Anthony Dirrell,” Plant replied, referring to his KO of the Year ninth-round blasting of Dirrell this past October on the Deontay Wilder-Robert Helenius undercard. “What did I do to Anthony Dirrell?”
Benavidez then stepped up to the podium. “You want to do something?”
“You’re a tough guy,” Plant remarked. “A lot of rah-rah stuff.”
“This guy is about to cry,” Benavidez mocked as security further separated the fighters “Look at his eyes. I know a p***y when I see one. What do you want to do? We could go outside the hotel. You’re a f***king p***y.
“The dude is scared,” Plant countered. “He’s so mad. You’re not going to do nothing. On March 25th, I’m going to be there; I’m going to be in shape. I’m not going to be on cocaine, and I’m going to whoop his a**.”
When Benavidez got his turn at the podium, he was seething with rage and not holding back.
“There’s been a lot of sh*t talking going back and forth,” Benavidez said. “But on March 25th I get to put hands on Caleb Plant. And trust me when I say I’m going to beat the living shit out of you, p**sy.
“And then when you’re on the f**kin’ ground, bleeding from your f**kin’ mouth you’ll learn how to respect a real f**kin’ monster. This dude, he has 13 knockouts. He thinks just because he knocked Anthony Dirrell out that’s supposed to mean something to me. I beat the sh*t out of Anthony Dirrell when I was 23 years old. I was champion before you, I got three f**kin’ belts right now. I’m what you want to f**kin’ be. You a chump. You ain’t nothing. And come March 25th, mark my words, I’m gonna put this mother**ker in the hospital.”
Plant and Benavidez meet March 25 at MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas, atop a Showtime PPV event in a battle for Benavidez’s interim WBC super middleweight title.
