O’Shaquie Foster (22-3, 12 KOs) will face WBC super featherweight champion Robson Conceição (19-2-1, 9 KOs) in a rematch on November 2nd on ESPN+ in Verona, New York.
The former WBC 130-lb champion Foster, 30, is getting a second chance after the WBC ordered the rematch due to the outcry from him and his fans.
Foster’s Passive Style Leads to Defeat
Foster failed to let his hands go and was out-hustled by the ambitious, motivated 2016 Olympic gold medalist Conceicao in their clash on July 6th at the Prudential Center in Newark, New Jersey. Placing Foster and Shakur Stevenson on the same card last July was a cup of poison for the fans at the Prudential Center. Foster’s style for the Conceicao fight looked like he’d narrowed it from Shakur because he made the fight unwatchable.
“I do think I won the fight,” Conceicao said about his fight with Foster. “He didn’t come to fight. He was running and running. I was the winner.”
I had Conceicao winning 11-1, which was an easy fight to score. He pushed the fight in every round while Foster stayed against the ropes, trying to make Conceicao miss and fighting brief spurts. If you’re a trainer, you must let your fighters know they can’t fight the way Foster did and expect to be given decision wins when facing someone who is fighting hard and pressuring.
Foster had gotten a questionable 12-round split decision in his previous fight against Abraham Nova last February when he was outworked similarly. Ultimately, Nova completely outworked Foster and looked like the winner, but they gave it to the Texas native.
Can Foster Adapt?
Foster should have learned from that contest that he can’t fight that way and expect to be given questionable decisions repeatedly. Beating Nova by a razor-close controversial decision was a red flag that Foster needed to change the way he fights going into his match with Conceicao, but he didn’t.
Fighting like a carbon copy of Shakur Stevenson, Foster played it safe, using the three-foot step-back move all night to keep out of harm’s way, but he failed to fight. Afterward, Foster seemed in denial, failing to recognize that he’d fought scared and letting the motivated Brazilian Conceicao outwork him.
I watched the Foster vs. Conceicao fight twice, and it was easy to score. The Olympic gold medalist Conceicao knew how to win by outworking Foster, who seemed to think he would win a victory on the cheap by playing it safe, using his Shakur-esque style, thinking the judges would value that.
If Foster doesn’t change his safety-first Shakur-like fighting style, he will lose the rematch with Conceicao, and his career will sink into the mud. I don’t think Foster can change. He doesn’t have the dog in him to battle tough guys like Conceicao, Anthony Cacace, or Emanuel Navarrete.
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