David Benavidez To Headline April 18 Show in Phoenix

David Benavidez is the latest to get a homecoming headliner.

The unbeaten 23-year old will head to Phoenix, Arizona for the first time in nearly five years, as he will make the first defense of his 168-pound title. The hometown showcase will take place April 18, live on Showtime from the Arizona Federal Theatre (nee Dodge Theatre) in downtown Phoenix, with the venue confirming the event on its company website. Benavidez also confirmed the fight date on his verified social media account.

An official opponent has yet to be finalized for the event as this goes to publish. Two sources with knowledge of the situation have informed BoxingScene.com that it will likely be Colombia’s Roamer Alexis Angulo, confirming a development first reported by The Athletic boxing insider Mike Coppinger.

Benavidez (22-0, 19KOs) last fought in his hometown in May 2015, when he was just 18-years old and still wrapping up his second full year in the pro ranks. He returns home as a two-time and reigning super middleweight titlist, having regained his belt in a 9th round stoppage of Anthony Dirrell last September in Los Angeles.

Original conditions for his bout with Dirrell called for the winner to next face Turkey’s Avni Yildirim in a mandatory title defense. Such a bout was targeted for a tentative January 25 Fox Sports Pay-Per-View planned, only for that event to be scrapped when its intended headliner, unbeaten and unified welterweight titlist Errol Spence was forced out after suffering injuries sustained in a single car accident.

Efforts to find a new home for Benavidez’s title hit a temporary road block after Yildirim suffered a minor injury which would keep him out of the ring until late spring to early summer. Not wanting to grow stale on the sidelines, Benavidez and his team were approved to proceed with a voluntary title defense, with his mandatory versus Yildirim to come later this summer, assuming he wins in April.

The fallout of the original plans came right on time for Angulo (26-1, 22KOs), who turns 36 later this month. The hard hitting super middleweight picked up perhaps the biggest win of his career in his last bout, scoring a 10-round decision over previously unbeaten Anthony Sims Jr. this past January in his adopted hometown of Miami. The Super Bowl-themed card saw Angulo outhustle a rising prospect 10 years his junior, though unaware to anyone at the time that it would lead to his second career title fight.

Angulo’s lone career defeat came in a failed June 2018 title bid versus then-unbeaten 168-pound beltholder Gilberto Ramirez, having since won three straight.

As for Benavidez, it’s the latest opportunity provided by Premier Boxing Champions (PBC) for a fighter to perform in front of a live hometown audience. It also comes on the heels of his heated divisional rival, unbeaten titlist Caleb Plant (20-0, 12KOs) fighting for the first time in his home region of Nashville, Tennessee.

Plant played to a vibrant crowd this past February, scoring a one-sided 10th round stoppage of Germany’s Vincent Feigenbutz atop a PBC on Fox tripleheader live from the Bridgestone Arena, home to the NHL’s Nashville Predators and which hadn’t hosted a televised boxing event since 2008.

Benavidez’s next fight and its backdrop carries a similar history. The hosting venue was a fixture on Telefutura’s Solo Boxeo circuit in the early 2000s, back then known as Dodge Theatre but which hasn’t hosted a boxing show since a ShoBox card in January 2007 featuring then-unbeaten prospect Juan Manuel Lopez.

Jake Donovan is a senior writer for BoxingScene.com. Twitter: @JakeNDaBox