O’Shaquie Foster secured one of the yr’s largest wins Saturday when he dropped three-division champion Emanuel Navarrete twice in the twelfth spherical, successful by unanimous resolution to unify three tremendous featherweight world titles.
Foster (26-3, 12 KOs) exploited Navarrete’s wild, unconventional punching by staying defensively sharp, throwing fast arms and returning his gloves to a high guard, epitomizing a philosophy of hit-and-don’t-get-hit at Frost Bank Center in San Antonio.
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Though there is one other world champion at tremendous featherweight, the WBA titleholder Anthony Cacace, Foster’s three-fight run over the previous 11 months — beating Stephen Fulton, Raymond Ford and now Navarrete — presents a case that he’s the reliable No. 1 at 130 kilos, with the WBC, WBO and IBF belts all in his possession.
It is akin to the run David Benavidez embarked on from 2023 to 2024, beating Caleb Plant, Demetrius Andrade and Oleksandr Gvozdyk in 15 months to gatecrash the pound-for-pound dialog.
Now, there is only one factor “Shock” desires next.
“I want to go undisputed,” he said after his twenty sixth skilled win. “I only need one more [belt] to become undisputed [champion] and fulfill my biggest dream.”
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Cacace defends that last remaining belt against Nick Ball in a WBA tremendous featherweight world title combat on Dec. 19.
With Foster conceding he only has “one or two fights left in me” at 130 kilos, it creates a deadline for a combat against the Cacace-Ball winner to materialize.
Foster desires that combat next, while suggesting the returning three-division champion Vasiliy Lomachenko — who watched Saturday’s occasion from ringside — first takes a “tune-up” combat before they meet. Lomachenko, 38, last fought in May 2024 and announced his retirement in June 2025.
“When I beat him, I don’t want no excuses,” Foster said of Lomachenko. “He’s been retired.”
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If and when it occurs, Lomachenko is a “skill-for-skill fight” Foster would relish. “I love it,” he said.
Once he leaves tremendous featherweight for light-weight, though, there’s only one combat Foster desires first.
“I’ll go see Shakur [Stevenson],” he said of the pound-for-pound star and four-division division, who gave Foster his props Saturday night time following the Navarrete win.
Said Stevenson:
Helluva fighter he will never give me my credit but I’ll be actual tonight he confirmed his stage. That’s a problem that would get me out of mattress. Let’s do it whenever he’s prepared
I’ll be here after his undisputed run!
Taken collectively, a 2027 sequence of bouts involving the Cacace-Ball winner for the undisputed title, Lomachenko in a battle between eras, and Stevenson in an all-American showdown could present Foster with a runway to translate his industry respect as we speak into breakout stardom tomorrow.
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