O’Shaquie Foster will have his cake and eat it, too.
WBC officials have revealed that Houston’s Foster has elected to retain his WBC 130lbs title, despite having just claimed the sanctioning body’s interim lightweight belt less than a week ago. Thursday’s ruling came with the additional perk that the two-time full junior lightweight titlist will “maintain special privileges in the lightweight division.”
The decision made by Foster bails out the WBC, which assigned its interim lightweight title to two separate contests five weeks apart.
A ruling was already made during its annual convention in late November to upgrade a previously ordered Ricardo Nunez-Jadier Herrera eliminator to a secondary title fight, targeted for January 10 in Dusseldorf, Germany.
With that, questions were immediately raised when it was revealed that the same belt was at stake for Fulton’s eventual lopsided decision win over Stephen Fulton on December 6 in San Antonio. Foster, 24-3 (12 KOs), was due to defend his WBC 130lbs belt, but Fulton, 23-2 (8 KOs), missed weight by 2lbs, despite moving up from featherweight.
TGB Promotions filed an emergency petition with the WBC for its secondary 135lbs belt to be at stake for the contest. The sanctioning body agreed, with the caveat that the winner then had to decide within 15 days at which weight he would remain.
Fulton still held the WBC 126lbs title at the time but has since vacated, as recently reported by BoxingScene.
In the immediate aftermath of his win on Saturday, Foster called for a showdown with reigning WBC 135lbs titlist Shakur Stevenson, 24-0 (11 KOs). The bout never figured to see the light of day; Stevenson is already set to challenge lineal and WBO 140lbs champion Teofimo Lopez on January 31 at Madison Square Garden in New York City.
Foster could have played the odds and held on to the secondary 135lbs belt in anticipation of Stevenson eventually vacating in lieu of returning to the division. That would be the assumption should the undefeated three-division titlist successfully unseat Lopez at junior welterweight.
Instead, Foster will now seek to consummate his second WBC 130lbs title reign. He regained the belt last November 2 in a narrow decision win over Robson Conceicao, avenging a highly questionable defeat against the 2016 Olympic gold medalist last July – ironically, on a Stevenson undercard in the latter’s hometown in Newark, New Jersey.
The controversial loss to Conceicao ended Foster’s first title reign nearly 17 months after he claimed the belt in a February 2023 victory over then-unbeaten Rey Vargas.
Foster made two successful defenses during his first title tour. He earned a dramatic 12th-round knockout of Eduardo “Rocky” Hernandez in an October 2023 clash on the road in Cancun, Mexico, in a bout in which he trailed on two of the three cards. Four months later, he edged Abraham Nova via split decision to retain his title at Madison Square Garden Theater in New York City.
For now, Foster remains without a mandatory challenger, though that will soon change. As previously reported by BoxingScene, former WBC 126lbs titlist Mark Magsayo will face Italy’s Michael Magnesi. Their ordered clash is currently budgeted as a title eliminator but will likely become an interim title fight.
