Short answer, yes: Joseph “The Beefcake” Benavidez does have the tools—the discipline, the energy, the aggression and the excitement factor—that one needs if he’s going to be a world champion.
To know this, you didn’t even have to watch his fight with Eddie Wineland last night. All you had to do was go on YouTube and check out a highlight or two of Benavidez in action.
The only people he has not beaten are guys named Dominick Cruz, but Benavidez has beaten two former WEC bantamweight champions, one of which was formerly seen as pound for pound, one of the best fighters in the sport.
In some minds, he also beat the current UFC bantamweight champion in his WEC 50 rematch with Dominick Cruz.
In hindsight, Benavidez would be the first choice of many for the next crack at the UFC bantamweight champion after the winner of UFC on Versus 6’s Cruz-Demetrious Johnson title bout fights the winner of UFC 139’s Urijah Faber-Brian Bowles fight.
Realistically though, would Joseph Benavidez‘s tools help him acquire gold at 135?
Maybe and maybe not, but that is mostly due to the size of Benavidez, not at all because of what he brings to the fight game.
Like many in the MMA community, I find it hard to believe that a drop to Flyweight in 2012 will do anything less than benefit his career.
People say that if Dana White gets the flyweight division off the ground in 2012, Benavidez and Johnson could be considered among the best flyweights in the world.
Both have the tools to do it, and there’s little question if they can do it at 135, but right now, it’s still looking like exciting fights are at 135 for both, while 125 is where the big paydays and title aspirations are at.
Then again, maybe we’re all underestimating what it is that the Team Alpha Male speed demon and the Matt Hume product can do by assuming they’d do well at 125 when they’ve seen good success at 135.
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