Emanuel Navarrete vs. Eduardo Nunez | DAZN - February 28, 2026

[MightyWarrior]

Well now we know a big welterweight will beat up a small lightweight. Dumb referee and useless corner should’ve stopped that earlier no question. Nunez is one hell of a brave dude, but no idea why he’s got the nickname sugar

[Evander]

They let it go as far as they could.
Navarrete looked alright.

[Evander]

See Vargas v Quintana
Vargas is tough, but he looks vulnerable to the body.

[dan28uk]

was a great fight think the corner or doctor should have stopped it round before would love to see rematch

[Evander]

Quintana was too lax, he let Vargas hit him at will with point scoring punches, although not damaging.
Had a big back up punch he rarely threw and landed with regularity when he could.
That's what lost him the fight

[forcefraser]

Sugar was tough but was beaten up by a tougher guy

[Ruthless-RKO]

[gilgamesh]

See Vargas v Quintana
Vargas is tough, but he looks vulnerable to the body.

He was throwing such vicious body punches himself that when I saw him get a little hurt from a body punch himself I remembered the old Boxing adage "Body punchers don't like it to the body"

[Ruthless-RKO]

WORLD OF SWEET OPTIONS AWAITS EMANUEL NAVARRETE AFTER STOPPING NUNEZ

Emanuel Navarrete stopped Eduardo Nunez with ease Saturday to unify titles in the junior lightweight division.

A wide variety of options now await “Vaquero,” who holds the WBO and IBF titles at 130 pounds.

During his post-fight press conference at the Desert Diamond Arena in Arizona, Navarrete discussed further unifying the division with a fight against WBC champion O'Shaquie Foster, facing WBO featherweight champion Rafael Espinoza, and giving Charly Suarez a rematch after their May fight was controversially ruled a No Contest.

Navarrete (40-2-1, 33 KOs, 1 NC) also entertained the idea of moving up to 135 pounds for a second time in hopes of becoming a four-division titleholder, while others took it one step further and pondered an unlikely pitting against The Ring and WBO 140-pound champion Shakur Stevenson.

As a world of savory options awaits after stopping “Sugar” Nunez, Navarrete threw his sombrero into the mix to be considered for a supporting role during Canelo Alvarez’s return on September 12 on the “Mexico vs. The World” show in Saudi Arabia.
“Who wouldn't want to be involved on a night like that and have the possibility of supporting Canelo,”said Navarrete. “But it's premature to talk about things at the moment. I just want to stay calm and see what the shuffled cards look like on the table.”

While everyone focused on the future, Navarrete was still enjoying the present and how he nullified Nunez (29-2, 27 KOs) in a fight he was projected to lose as a betting underdog.

“It was a strong and difficult fight, but it was a really great fight from my point of view,” said Navarrete. “It was wonderful to finally unify titles. It was a long time coming. You can feel his strength, but he wasn’t able to solidly connect on me the way that he would have wanted to.”

The fight was stopped a second into the 11th round when the ringside physician deemed Nunez unfit to continue due to a deeply damaged right eye.
Navarrete really piled on the pressure in rounds nine and ten, landing 80 punches in those frames, 70 to the face of his fellow Mexican rival.

Nunez got off to a slow start in the fight and never gained momentum in what materialized to be a competitive, one-sided clash.

Overall, Navarrete outlanded Nunez 236 to 140, per CompuBox.

“I'm hoping Nunez can recover and come back soon,” he added. “We're professionals. This sport can look cruel at times, and even though I have great respect for Nunez, I wouldn't make that decision [to hold back] for personal and sporting reasons. It would be a lack of respect for my career, my team, the work that I've put in. Nunez was a strong fighter.
Despite being hurt, he continued to fight. I'm just grateful to him for showing the will to fight.

“The key to making my victory look easy was that I had some really great sparring for this fight to fit Nunez’s style. We were able to develop the plan perfectly to neutralize his abilities.”

The win revived the 31-year-old Navarrete’s career after a 27-month stretch yielding a run of uneven results.

Before the Suarez fight, Navarrete stopped Oscar Valdez in six rounds, lost to Denys Berinchyk via split decision in his lightweight debut, and settled for a majority draw against Robson Conceicao despite dropping him twice.

“I didn't expect to have such a prolonged career and so much longevity,” said Navarrete.
“But I was really happy with what I saw tonight. I am going into a new stage of my career. We tried new things in training, and you saw the fruits of that labor. I feel like I am far away from retiring at the moment. I am sure there are going to be some spectacular things on the horizon for me.”

[handsofstone]

Nunez showed Navarrete far too much respect by the time he started taking chances his eye was shutting bad, Navarrete bossed things, winging in punches from both hands, digging lefts to the body and getting on top of Nunez who tried to move but was still taking too many punches, he fared a bit better late on, showed a lot of stones when the eye was a slit but it was inevitable it wasn't gonna go 12 and sure enough start of the 11th the ref finally halted it

[Ruthless-RKO]

[Ruthless-RKO]

Results

Emanuel Navarrete def. Eduardo “Sugar” Nunez by TKO
Doctor recommended stoppage just after bell to start round 11
Navarrete retains WBO super featherweight title, wins IBF super featherweight title

Emliano Vargas def. Agustin Quintana by TKO
Referee stopped the fight after ninth round

Abel Ramos def. Tahmir Smalls by split decision
Official scores: 96-94 Smalls, 97-93 and 98-92 Ramos

Arturo Cardenas and Jordan Martinez fought to a split draw
Official scores: 95-95, 96-94 Cardenas, 98-92 Martinez

[Ruthless-RKO]

Emanuel Navarrete belongs on P4P list, says Eddie Hearn

Emanuel Navarrete is a unified junior lightweight champion, a three-division titleholder, and has been an active champion since 2018 while appearing in 17 world title fights.

After crushing Eduardo Nunez on Saturday, the conversation quickly shifted to whether WBO and IBF junior welterweight champion Navarrete (40-2-1, 33 KOs, 1 NC) should be considered for a prestigious, yet subjective accolade.

“I think it's time to see him on the pound-for-pound list,” Matchroom Boxing head Eddie Hearn said during the post-fight press conference at the Desert Diamond Arena in Arizona.

“I have to say, what a fighter Navarrete is. I've watched a lot of boxing for 40 years, and I have never seen a fighter so relaxed, awkward, and dangerous. He wasn't breathing. He doesn't look like, ‘This guy should fight like that.’ He has a style that causes anybody problems. He's an incredible fighter.”

Navarrete is not on The Ring’s pound-for-pound list, but after his vicious beating of Nunez, the former 122- and 126-pound titleholder and The Ring’s new No. 1-rated 130-pounder certainly started trending toward serious consideration.

However, it can’t be forgotten that Navarrete is fortunate that his fight against Charly Suarez in May didn’t result in a loss. Navarrete originally walked away with a technical decision that was later ruled a No Contest when previously unavailable footage showed a punch caused a fight-ending cut and not a headbutt.

Navarrete came into the Nunez fight with a record of 1-1-1, as well as the No Contest, over his last four fights, with the loss coming in his lone lightweight bout against Denys Berinchyk for a vacant title.

Despite the uneven results, Carl Moretti, Top Rank’s vice president of boxing operations, further stamped Hearn’s pound-for-pound sentiment.

“If he hasn't already, he certainly should be on the pound-for-pound list,” said Moretti. “What you've seen in the past is all a result of tonight. When you're fighting for world titles across different weight classes, it shines on a night like tonight.

“No disrespect to Nunez. He was the biggest puncher in the division, and it was a very competitive one-sided fight. As the fight went on, Navarrete hit second gear. His length is his best advantage, and that's a problem for any division.”

“Vaquero” Navarrete revived his career with a vengeance at the age of 31 by reinventing his training and nutrition program.
Nunez (29-2, 27 KOs) had to suffer the consequences. He was never really in the fight, and the action got even more out of hand once his tattered right eye started shutting in the ninth round.

Hearn couldn't stomach the one-sided traffic and urged the resilient Nunez to be saved from himself, which was ultimately the case when the ringside physician advised the fight to end one second into the 11th round.

“I felt that Sugar was going to get stopped,” said Hearn. “He couldn't see, and at that stage, there was no way of winning the fight. So for me, I hate going over to the corner, because that's their job. But I felt like the fight should have been stopped. They left it in the hands of the doctor, and for me, the doctor should have stopped it a round before, but they gave him an opportunity. I'm glad the fight was stopped when it was.

“Nunez is devastated at the moment. I told him Navarrete is the best of the best. Everyone saw how much heart he had and that he didn't quit. He never stopped, even when he couldn't see. He just wanted to keep going, and I told him you're not the best yet. But he's probably second. He'll be out for a while with the eye, but he will be back, and I believe he will be a world champion again.

“Coming into this fight, they said Navarrete has a new fitness trainer and nutritionist. You saw the difference. When he doesn't take it so seriously, sometimes he becomes a little unstuck. When he does [take it seriously], which he clearly did in this fight, he is going to be difficult to beat.”

[Ruthless-RKO]

An overdue Emanuel Navarrete appreciation

A little guy isn’t supposed to enter the ring with love handles.

A heavyweight? Sure. You could always pinch an inch on Larry Holmes, and you can just about pinch a foot on Tyson Fury.

But in the junior featherweight, featherweight and junior lightweight divisions, rare is the world-class, in-his-prime fighter with that visible jiggle above his hips.

Experienced boxing observers know it doesn’t matter much, that big muscles don’t win fights – if anything, being musclebound can limit fluidity of motion or lead a boxer to tire faster. But it’s hard not to let such aesthetics influence your thinking anyway.

Certainly, there’s a natural instinct to see a guy like Emanuel Navarrete – who’s never had a hint of muscular definition, who perpetually looks like he should be fighting one division lower than he is – and sell him slightly short, whether in making a prediction for his next fight or in assessing his overall ceiling.

Well, it’s time to stop selling “Vaquero” short. On Saturday night, as a betting underdog against Eduardo “Sugar” Nunez – not because he deserved to be, but because the oddsmakers, too, proved susceptible to selling him short – Navarrete scored the kind of win that reframes a fighter’s legacy.

With his one-sided 11th-round TKO of the younger, seemingly stronger Nunez, Navarrete may have just flipped his Hall of Fame odds.

Prior to this result, his resume settled in right alongside any number of good, solid, lower weight class titleholders with names destined to linger eternally on the International Boxing Hall of Fame’s ballot. He was a Paulie Ayala, a Vuyani Bungu, an Acelino Freitas, a Chris John. He was a Leo Santa Cruz – who hasn’t made the ballot yet but will soon, and once he does, he figures to remain a nominee in perpetuity.

Navarrete was headed down the same path as those men.

But overnight, I suspect this Mexican Cowboy went from underdog for entry to favorite.

Navarrete needed one more win, one victory achieved in style at a time when folks were doubting him. And he got it.

The doubts were understandable, and not just because of Navarrete’s physique. (By the way, he reportedly hired a nutritionist for the first time ahead of this fight, to great practical effect, but it did nothing to eliminate the love handles.)

Navarrete turned 31 in January, and he has the kind of energy-based style that tends not to lead to long careers.

At 28, when he had to get off the canvas to turn back unheralded Liam Wilson, the whispers began. Two fights later, he battled Robson Conceicao to a majority draw, despite entering the fight as an overwhelming -1300 favorite. Then Vaquero moved up to lightweight and lost by split decision to Denys Berinchyk – Navarrete’s first defeat in a dozen years.

Two fights later, on the other side of his 30th birthday, Navarrete battled on roughly even terms with lightly regarded Charly Suarez until the fight was stopped due to a cut over the defending titlist’s eyebrow. It initially went into the books as a technical decision win for Navarrete, but after replays made clear that a Suarez punch caused the cut, the result was changed to a no-contest. Had it been ruled correctly on the spot, Suarez would have captured the belt by TKO.

Add it all up, and over the three years preceding Saturday’s fight with Nunez, Navarrete had a draw, a loss and a no-contest that should have been a loss, to go along with three wins, one of which was decidedly unimpressive.

There was every reason to think Navarrete’s prime, which began in 2018, had ended in 2023 and he was now on the slide.

Navarrete has been a pro for 14 years and had taken part in 16 title fights before facing Nunez, reaching at least the start of the 12th round nine times, including in one non-title bout. Fighters who come forward, rely on volume, seek to overwhelm opponents and endure a lot of tough rounds don’t usually climb ladders again once they’ve started going down chutes. If you’ve shown signs of fading, there typically isn’t a period of un-fading.

And that’s why it was so impressive and so stunning that Navarrete just scored arguably the best win of his 44-fight career.

It wasn’t quite on the level of 37-year-old Roberto Duran upsetting 28-year-old Iran Barkley, but there was a similar flavor. A lot of people didn’t realize Navarrete still had that in him.

For the first four rounds, he used his length and boxed beautifully, the jab causing Nunez all sorts of problems. In rounds five and six, the 28-year-old Nunez realized he needed to rumble to have a chance, so a war broke out – and Navarrete was still getting the better of most of the exchanges.

One call from DAZN blow-by-blow man Todd Grisham in the ninth round perfectly encapsulated the experience of taking on Navarrete. “Nunez hammering away,” Grisham said, as Sugar enjoyed a momentary rally. As soon as those words came out of Grisham’s mouth, Navarrete was dishing out something more fierce in return, prompting Grisham, after a momentary pause, to continue, “but then he’s got to go through this!”

Nunez’s right eye swelled nearly shut over the course of the ninth and Navarrete whacked it bloody in the 10th, prompting an appropriate, merciful stoppage as the 11th round began. Nunez had no hope of coming back, as he trailed 98-92 on two cards and 100-90 on the third. And with that, Navarrete snapped his opponent’s 19-fight win streak that had spanned nearly eight years.

To my eyes, this wasn’t the best win or greatest performance of Navarrete’s career – but it places a strong second, behind only his August 2023 unanimous decision victory over Oscar Valdez in their first fight.

With Navarrete coming off the rocky Wilson battle, Valdez was favored by as much as -190, while Navarrete was up to a +160 ’dog.

Navarrete smacked one of his eyes shut, too, and controlled the action almost to the extent he did against Nunez, in a striking display of everything that makes Vaquero an absolute pain in the ass.

Valdez just couldn’t get inside on him, never knew where the punches were coming from and couldn’t find a lull in the awkward Navarrete’s output during which he could attack. Valdez constantly looked like he was about to pull the trigger, only to see a four-punch combination launched in his direction, handcuffing him. Valdez’s corner told him all the right things – to be patient and look for the opportunity for a counter left hook – but he just couldn’t find a spot to meaningfully apply his punching power.

My longtime boxing media colleague Bill Dettloff posted a tweet that night that stuck with me: “Every fighter watching Navarrete: ‘Sign the contract. I’ll wreck this mf.’ Two rounds in: ‘WTF?!’”

Maybe there was a degree of mirage to Navarrete’s struggles the last three years. He had surgery on his left hand after the Conceicao draw. He clearly moved up too far in weight when he lost to Berinchyk at 135lbs. Perhaps he waited too long to hire a nutritionist.

It’s possible there was no decline, but rather just a series of suboptimal situations and preparations.

Whatever the case, Navarrete, with momentum, popularity and two of the division’s four belts, is perfectly positioned now at 130lbs for additional meaningful fights that could burnish his Hall of Fame credentials.

He has an alphabet mandate to give Suarez a rematch. Or he could vacate that strap and take on fellow titlist O’Shaquie Foster if there’s more money in that. Foster and Navarrete are ranked first and second in the division by the Transnational Boxing Rankings Board, and the lineal title is vacant, meaning that fight would crown a new recognized champion.

Alternatively, Navarrete could take on the winner of the upcoming Anthony Cacace-James “Jazza” Dickens bout, or he could square off against Raymond Ford. There are also several outstanding featherweights who may be interested in moving up to test themselves against Vaquero, including Angelo Leo, Rafael Espinoza and Brandon Figueroa. There’s not a bad fight on paper in the bunch.

Navarrete vs. Nunez looked like an exceptional fight on paper. It had its thrilling moments, but it wasn’t a Fight of the Year contender – because it wasn’t competitive enough. Navarrete was just that damned good.

And Nunez acknowledged as much after the fight. He even fanboy-ed out a bit during the post-fight interviews, gushing with praise and trying on his conqueror’s cowboy hat.

In that moment, Navarrete felt not like your typical championship-level mid-career Mexican boxer with something to prove. He crossed over into the realm of Mexican living legend who had proven all he needs to. He may still be in his prime, may still have several elite years left, but he also has become one of those veteran Mexican warriors idolized by the younger fighters on their way up.

As he should be.

Who cares if he isn’t a body-beautiful? The parts of his body that matter most are his fists. Those are the body parts he’ll be dipping into a bucket of plaster in Canastota, New York, soon after his career is over.