PHOENIX – At his best, Emanuel Navarrete makes men decide just how much punishment they are capable of enduring.
Consider it a torture chamber of punches.
So even though Navarrete’s Saturday night opponent at Footprint Center was the immensely tough former two-division champion Oscar Valdez, Navarrete – nicknamed “Vaquero” – went about his business.
And after scoring knockdowns set up by the WBO junior-lightweight champion’s thunderous punches, he established Valdez’s breaking point thanks to a destructive body shot in the sixth round.
Valdez, 33 and knowing well from their first meeting last year that the beatings would continue, stayed down, a pained, heartbroken expression gripping his face as referee Raul Caiz Jr. counted him out and embraced him in comfort.
“We tried. That’s the most important thing. We tried to get the victory,” Valdez said. “I wish it was a better result. No excuses from me. He beat me well.
“It’s the same old Vaquero. He throws awkward shots. You don’t see them coming.”
Navarrete, meanwhile, basked in a redemptive triumph after failing to win a fourth division belt in a May lightweight title fight.
“I told you my left hand is good and I was going to throw it in a variety of different ways,” Navarrete said. “You’re witnessing the second stage of my career and I’ll be moving on in special ways.”
Navarrete 39-2-1 (32 KOs) took special pride in delivering the left-handed body shot to end the bout while legendary countryman Julio Cesar Chavez sat watching at ringside.
Valdez 32-3 might mull retirement with this loss, and Navarrete delivered his Mexican countryman his flowers afterward.
“I had to work hard in each round. I had to push him back. He comes forward,” Navarrete said. “And that was the right strategy to take down Valdez, who is always strong.”
Navarrete, 29, blitzed Valdez, 33, by wide scores in their first meeting 16 months ago, bloodying the former champion’s right eye and wounding his pride deeply.
In the interim, Valdez claimed an emotional stoppage of Liam Wilson, who had knocked down Navarrete earlier in his career, and three-division champion Navarrete turned in the May stinker in losing to new WBO lightweight champion Denys Berinchyk.
This time, Navarrete staged a less deliberate, less subtle execution.
Navarrete banked on his long arms to hurt Valdez with shots that made Valdez duck down in the first round, with Navarrete finding him with a vicious right to the side of the head for a knockdown.
Valdez displayed his pedigree and grit to land scoring blows early in the second, but Navarrete retaliated with more brutal punches, endangering Valdez.
Navarrete fought to pursue the finish, knowing Valdez couldn’t end him.
Late in the fourth, Navarrete nailed Valdez with three consecutive right hands and Valdez went down again.
The free-swinging attack accentuated the fighters’ divide in age, strength and length and Valdez is just too inherently wired to not employ an evasive response.
A Navarrete punch late in the fifth knocked out Valdez’s mouthpiece, and he just left it there, walking with determination back to his corner as if he was prepared to finish the brawl sans protection.
Navarrete, of course, showed no mercy, teeing off as the action resumed and standing in watch as Valdez stayed on the canvas, the fight ending ast the 2:42 mark.