Benavidez-Ramírez to potentially feature another great addition to its umdercard.
When David Benavidez and Gilberto Ramírez collide on the 2nd of May, the latter’s WBA and WBO cruiserweight titles will be on the line.
The unified championship at stake is almost an afterthought, as the matchup stands entirely on its own. Were it a non-title fight, it would still be incredibly intriguing.
But as it happens, Mexico’s first cruiserweight champion in history will be defending his status against one of the best American fighters in the world.
It’s been mentioned many times how Americans have had a massively depleted heavyweight presence in recent years, but it would be more accurate to say that the heavier divisions as a whole do not see many world-ranked fighters from the United States anymore.
Before Terence Crawford, the last American to hold the WBA super-middleweight championship was Byron Mitchell, whose second and last reign as champion ended in 2003.
As for the WBO title? The only American to win that before Crawford was Thomas Hearns, who vacated the belt in 1990.
When David Benavidez was upgraded to WBC light-heavyweight champion, he became the first American to hold the belt since Chad Dawson lost it in 2013. And if Benavidez beats Gilberto Ramírez, he will become the first American cruiserweight champion since Steve Cunningham lost his title in 2011.
Anyway, with Benavidez-Ramírez being such a good headliner, a great undercard was not guaranteed. However, it appears that that’s exactly what fans will be getting.
New reports are now telling us that former WBC bridgerweight and WBC interim cruiserweight title challenger Ryan Rozicki (21-1-1, 20 KOs) will be facing off against Robin Sirwan Safar (19-0, 13 KOs).
This exciting clash may be landing on the undercard of Benavidez-Ramírez, adding to a potentially stacked line-up of fights in the supporting cast.
Sweden’s Safar had a breakout performance in beating a past-prime Sergey Kovalev on the undercard of the first Tyson Fury vs. Oleksandr Usyk fight. He has since gone 2-0, having been set to challenge Gilberto Ramírez himself before the Mexican was forced to pull out with a hand injury.
Canada’s big-punching Rozicki previously challenged Oscar Rivas in an unsuccessful bid for the inaugural WBC bridgerweight title in 2021. He has gone 8-0-1 since then, most notably drawing in a rematch with Yamil Alberto Peralta for the WBC interim cruiserweight strap.
Rozicki was also meant to fight current WBC cruiserweight champion Noel Mikaelian on a number of occasions, a doomed fight that ultimately fell through every single time it had been made.
Now he will potentially be squaring off with a contender equally as hungry as him on a massive bill, something that will provide both men with huge exposure no matter the outcome.
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