{"id":958007,"date":"2026-05-13T22:52:11","date_gmt":"2026-05-13T22:52:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/958007\/"},"modified":"2026-05-13T22:52:11","modified_gmt":"2026-05-13T22:52:11","slug":"david-benavidez-says-zuffa-boxing-is-preventing-him-from-making-the-biggest-fight-in-the-world","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/958007\/","title":{"rendered":"David Benavidez says Zuffa Boxing is preventing him from making ‘the biggest fight in the world’"},"content":{"rendered":"

David Benavidez<\/a> believes he is being denied the chance from making the biggest fight in boxing.<\/p>\n

Benavidez became a three-weight world champion when he stopped Gilberto Ramirez to win the WBA and WBO crusierweight titles.<\/a><\/p>\n

While \u2018The Mexican Monster\u2019 is now expected to drop back down to 175lbs, some boxing fans want to see a cruiserweight showdown against fellow unbeaten star Jai Opetaia<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Opetaia was the IBF cruiserweight champion, but was stripped of his belt after signing with Dana White\u2019s Zuffa Boxing and taking part in an unsanctioned bout against Brandon Glanton.<\/p>\n

Benavidez revealed after the fight that he would be happy to face Opetaia, but believes that decision to sign with Zuffa is preventing the bout from happening.<\/p>\n

\n

\u201cThat\u2019s the biggest fight in the world, especially in this weight division. That\u2019s definitely a fight I want. I\u2019m not scared of anybody. If he wants to get that fight, we can get that fight.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know why he went to Zuffa. We could have made this fight right after this one\u2026I\u2019m not going to go there and fight for the Zuffa title.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat would be a great fight to make for the future. I respect Jai Opetaia, he\u2019s a great fighter, but he has to come over here to make these fights happen, because we can\u2019t make no fights in Zuffa.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Benavidez went on further to say that those who sign with Zuffa are missing out on bigger opportunities.<\/p>\n

\n

\u201c[Fighters] are definitely losing their power. There\u2019s a lot of politics in that. Dana White has shown that he doesn\u2019t want to do fights with PBC, DAZN.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t want to sound like I\u2019m disrespecting them but that\u2019s just how it looks like from the outside. If we can come to an agreement and make a big fight, let\u2019s do it.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

If a clash between Benavidez and Opetaia was to take place, Hall of Fame inductee Tim Bradley has already revealed who he would back to come out on top.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"David Benavidez believes he is being denied the chance from making the biggest fight in boxing. Benavidez became…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":939867,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4108],"tags":[1935,79,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-958007","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-boxing","8":"tag-boxing","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/958007","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=958007"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/958007\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/939867"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=958007"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=958007"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=958007"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}