Oscar Valdez says that this is the “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. Former two-division world champion Valdez fought as well as he could, but his punches did not affect ‘El Vaquero’ Navarrete (38-2-1, 31 KOs).
The co-feature between WBO featherweight champion Rafael Espinoza and Robeisy Ramirez 2 should be the main event because their first fight on December 9, 2023, a year ago, was one of the most exciting of the year .
The 6’1″ Espinoza pulled off a major upset, beating two-time Olympic gold medalist Robeisy by a 12-round majority decision to dethrone him from his WBO 126-lb belt. He did a good job getting off the bridge in the fifth lap to come back to clear Robeisy and leave 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 it’s valid. If he wins this fight and looks spectacular, you have to buy his excuse for not being 100% last time.
Saturday’s Navarrete-Valdez 2 rematch will take place at the Footprint Center in Phoenix, Arizona. The event begins at 10:30 pm ET on ESPN and ESPN+.
“I feel that I can do much more in sports. After losing, I returned home. I was disappointed with my performance,” he 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 it again after a couple of losses. So, doing that fight was very important to me. This is the biggest fight of my life.”
Valdez is not saying if he will retire if he loses to Navarrete or not. There is no reason why he would have a good chance of beating some of the other champions in the 126 lb division. It’s asking a lot of Valdez to go against a big guy like Navarrete because he doesn’t have the size, power, or volume to match him.
“Now, he comes with a different method. In the first fight, I think it helped us both to adjust the details. Now, we are here using the tools that we extracted from the first fight. This fight, we will have more experience and the same heart,” he said Emanuel Navarrete.
ESPN+ Undercard at 5:30pm ET
- Lindolfo Delgado (21-0, 15 KOs) vs. Jackson Marinez (22-3, 10 KOs): light welterweight bout scheduled for ten rounds
- Richard Torrez Jr. (11-0, 10 KOs) vs. Issac Muñoz (18-1-1, 15 KOs): Heavy fight for eight rounds.
- Giovani Santillan (32-1, 17 KOs) vs. Fredrick Lawson (30-5, 22 KOs): Welterweight contest scheduled for ten rounds.
