Oscar Valdez says this is the “biggest fight of his life” in his rematch against WBO featherweight champion Emanuel Navarrete this Saturday night, December 7th.
(Credit: Top Rank)
Valdez (32-2, 24 KOs) was not competitive, losing a 12-round unanimous decision to Navarrete a year ago on August 12th. The former two-division world champion Valdez fought as well as he could, but his punches didn’t affect ‘El Vaquero’ Navarrete (38-2-1, 31 KOs).
The co-feature between WBO featherweight champion Rafael Espinoza and Robeisy Ramirez 2 should arguably be the main event because their first fight on December 9, 2023, a year ago, was one of the most exciting of the year.
Espinoza, 6’1″, pulled off a huge upset, beating the two-time Olympic gold medalist Robeisy by a 12-round majority decision to dethrone him of his WBO 126-lb belt. He did a good job of getting off the deck in the fifth round to come back to wear down Robeisy and drop him in the 12th to get the win.
Robeisy said in the build-up to this fight that he wasn’t at his best, but we’ll see if that’s valid. If he wins this fight and looks spectacular, you’d have to buy his excuse about not being 100% last time.
Saturday’s Navarrete-Valdez 2 rematch will occur at the Footprint Center in Phoenix, Arizona. The event starts at 10:30 p.m. ET on ESPN & ESPN+.
“I feel like I can do a lot more in the sport. After I lost, I went back home. I was disappointed by my performance,” said Oscar Valdez. “It’s not like other sports where you can lose and you can do better in the next season. In boxing, most people don’t want to see you again after a couple of losses. So, doing that fight was very important for me. This is the biggest fight of my life.”
Valdez doesn’t say if he’ll retire if he loses to Navarrete or not. There’s no reason to because he would have a good chance of beating some of the other champions in the 130-lb division. It’s asking a lot of Valdez to be going up against a guy as big as Navarrete because he doesn’t have the size, power, or volume to match him.
“Now, he’s coming with a different method. In the first fight, I think it helped both of us to adjust details. Now, we’re here utilizing the tools we extracted from the first fight. This fight, we’re going to have more experience and the same heart,” said Emanuel Navarrete.
ESPN+ Undercard at 5:30 p.m. ET
- Lindolfo Delgado (21-0, 15 KOs) vs. Jackson Marinez (22-3, 10 KOs): Light welterweight clash scheduled for ten rounds
- Richard Torrez Jr. (11-0, 10 KOs) vs. Issac Muñoz (18-1-1, 15 KOs): Heavyweight fight for eight rounds.
- Giovani Santillan (32-1, 17 KOs) vs. Fredrick Lawson (30-5, 22 KOs): Welterweight contest scheduled for ten rounds.
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