“The one which gets me essentially the most excited might be Beterbiev,” Benavidez said on the Ariel Helwani show. “Beterbiev has been the boogeyman for a very long time, so for me, being the monster, I got to go in there and take the boogeyman out.”
What makes this look bad is that in the identical interview, Benavidez dismissed a main, dangerous champion like Jai Opetaia resulting from an absence of belts, while concurrently chasing a 41-year-old Artur Beterbiev, who can be currently beltless.
Benavidez said within the interview that Opetaia is “two years away” because he was stripped of his IBF cruiserweight title.
Artur Beterbiev lost his undisputed status and all 4 major belts to Dmitry Bivol of their February 2025 rematch. By Benavidez’s own “belt logic,” Beterbiev must be off the table, yet he stays the “Monster’s” primary goal at light heavyweight.
“Beterbiev is 50 years old. Cokavidez should’ve fought him as an alternative of fighting Zurdo. This dude is a joke, all he does is talk,” a user on X Malevo posted.
One other user, umar ssenoga, wrote: “Beterbiev is old now. Bivol or Jai Opetaia, those the fights that make sense.”
It’s hard to argue with the fans on X when the mathematics doesn’t add up. If he wants the “Monster” label to mean something, he probably has to stop worrying about which sanctioning body belt is on the road and begin fighting the fellows persons are actually afraid of.
If Benavidez is the “Mexican Monster” in his prime, people wish to see him hunting the alpha predators, not legends whose clocks are winding down.