Caleb Plant revealed on Friday that he’d be getting back in the ring early next year after his loss to Canelo Alvarez on November 6th. The former IBF super middleweight champion ‘Sweethands’ Plant (21-1, 12 KOs) says he wants “big fights” against David Benavidez, Jermall Charlo, and other top fighters in the sport.
On Friday, Plant, 29, looked a little down in showing up at the Tremendo Official Brand Launch in Van Nuys, California.
Despite losing to the ‘Face of Boxing’ Canelo (57-1-2, 39 KOs) by an eleventh round knockout last November, Plant remains motivated about his career and can’t wait to get back in action to start winning again.
Plant is currently ranked #2 in Ring Magazine ratings at 168 and #4 WBC. When Canelo Alvarez begins vacating his four titles, which he’s expected to do if he doesn’t get beaten or stripped, Plant will be in an excellent sport to challenge for one of the belts.
“Just resting up a little bit and enjoying the holiday,” said Caleb Plant to Fighthype on Friday. “This is my first holiday in five years that I can enjoy, but I’ll be back next year.
“I want big fights, Benavidez, Charlo, or whoever. I want big fights.
“I just got to stay focused. If you’ve got a dream, just stay focused on it. We were disappointed, but regardless of what anyone else felt like, we were showing up to win, and I felt like we proved that,” said Plant on his loss to Canelo Alvarez.
Many boxing fans would like to see Plant take on the undefeated Jermall Charlo (32-0, 22 KOs) or the highly ranked former two-time WBC super middleweight champion David Benavidez (25-0, 22 KOs).
Benavidez has been quite vocal in calling out Plant in the past, saying that he believes he can beat the former IBF champion. Now would be a good time for Plant to take the highly-rated Benavidez up on his offer.
A win for Plant over Benavidez would put him right back in position for a second fight against Canelo. Even if Canelo chooses not of gith Plant, he would need to give up one of his belts if he opts not to defend against him.
“We put in a great performance, and we won quite a few of those rounds, a lot of those rounds, and we got caught,” Plant said of his defeat at the hands of the #1 pound-for-pound star Canelo. “That’s boxing, anyone can get caught, and we’ll be back,” said Plant.
The Canelo-Plant fight was even going into the later rounds of the battle, but Plant seemed to gas a little in the tenth round, and Canelo took advantage of it by dropping him twice in the 11th round to get the knockout.
Plant was well-paid for the fight with Canelo, reportedly getting a purse of over $10 million. A big chunk of that money went to paying taxes and other expenses, but he still did well. Nevertheless, Plant is now set for life financially and will live comfortably once he retires from the sport.
If Plant can get a fight against Benavidez or Charlo next year, there will be a lot of fan interest in those fights. You can argue that those would be pay-per-view-worthy contests for sure.
The only question is whether Plant wants to take on one of those killers in his first fight back after his loss to Canelo or choose to take a confidence-booster first?
“I’m still in a great spot, and I put in a great showing, and that’s something to feel good about,” said Plant. “But you can never feel good about a fight,” said Plant.
“That was a good fight; I thought he did great,” said former two-division world champion Danny ‘Swift’ Garcia in giving his assessment of Plant’s performance against Saul Canelo Alvarez.
He’s gonna get another a** kicking!
Both those guys will hurt him