By Chris Williams: Unbeaten Oscar Valdez (23-0, 19 KOs) will be defending his WBO World featherweight title on March 10 against an opponent still to be decided at the StubHub Center in Carson, California. The 26-year-old Valdez’s fight will be televised live on ESPN.
Valdez’s March 10 fight is to get the boxing public excited about a showdown against former 2 division world champion Carl Frampton (24-1, 14 KOs) for later next year. There’s no word whether Frampton will have one of his fights televised in the U.S so that the boxing public can get a glimpse of him. Thus far, Frampton has fought just once in the U.S in a poor effort in beating the late Alejandro Gonzalez Jr. by a 12 round unanimous decision on July 18, 2015.
That fight took place in El Paso, Texas. It was supposed to be a showcase fight for Frampton, but he ended up being made to look bad in getting dropped 2 times in round 1 by the then 22-year-old Gonzalez Jr. If this is a setup fight for Valdez to get the U.S casual boxing fans excited about a fight against Frampton, then you can expect Valdez to be fed a lower level fighter instead of someone good.
Valdez, 26, looked awful in beating Genesis Servania (29-1, 12 KOs) by a 12 round unanimous decision in his last fight on September 22. While the 3 judges scored the fight wide in Valdez’s favor, it was a close fight that could have gone either way. Valdez won, but the scoring was heavily tilted in his favor despite Servania getting the better of the action through much of the fight.
Servania staggered Valdez a couple of times, and had him on the verge of a knockout on one occasions. The thing is, Servania is not known for being a big puncher. With a 40 percent knockout percentage, Servania shouldn’t have been able to hurt Valdez as often as he did. There are some boxing fans who believe that Valdez’s punch resistance has deteriorated after he was badly hurt in his previous fight by big puncher Miguel Marriaga last April.
Marriaga was landing some of best shots on Valdez’s chin in that fight. Valdez won the fight by a 12 round unanimous decision. There’s no disputing that Valdez deserved the win, but he got his with some monstrous shots from Marriaga late in the fight. Valdez completely fell apart in the championship rounds, as he looked like a punching bag against Marriaga.
Since capturing the WBO featherweight title last year in beating Matias Carlos Adrian Rueda by a 2nd round knockout, Valdez has beaten Hiroshige Osawa, Marriaga and Servania. The win over Osawa was a good one for Valdez. But ever since that fight, Valdez has struggled in his matches against Marriaga and Servania.
The way Oscar Valdez is looking now, he’s not going to last much longer as the WBO featherweight champion. Valdez has taken too much punishment in his last 2 fights, and I think his days of being a championship level fighter are about over. If Frampton doesn’t get Valdez, someone else will. I think Frampton will beat Valdez, and take whatever is left of him and use it up.