By Robert Segal: Edgar Berlanga will be making his ring return tonight against Jason Quigley in a twelve round main event live on DAZN at Madison Square Garden in New York.
The unbeaten super middleweight contender Berlanga (20-0, 16 KOs) has been out of action for a year since biting his last opponent Roamer Alexis Angulo in June 2022.
Berlanga was suspended for six months, switched promoters, and dealt with a bicep injury. That’s a lot of things that the 26-year-old Berlanga dealt with in the past twelve months, and, surprisingly, he’s able to return to ring so soon.
With the inactivity, Berlanga wants to get his feet wet before taking on tougher fighters like Canelo Alvarez.
WHAT TIME IS THE BERLANGA – QUIGLEY FIGHT?
- Date: Saturday, June 24
- Start time: 8:00 p.m. ET / 1 a.m. BST
- Main event ringwalks (approx): 11:00 p.m. ET / 4:00 a.m. BST
- The card will stream live on DAZN in over 200 countries across the globe
- The fight will take place at the Hulu Theater in Madison Square Garden in New York City.
- The main card is set to get underway at 8:00 p.m. ET / 1 a.m. BST with the main event ringwalks scheduled for 11:00 p.m. ET / 4:00 a.m.
That’s where the 32-year-old Quigley (20-2, 14 KOs) comes in. He’ll give Berlanga a good test, and if he looks good, he’ll possibly get the Canelo fight in September.
The Berlanga vs. Quigley event will be shown live on DAZN this Saturday, June 24, at 8:00 p.m. ET.
Quigley is a nine-year pro, with his best win coming against Shane Mosley Jr in 2021. He was knocked out twice against Tureano Johnson in 2019 and Demetrius Andrade in 2021.
Berlanga should have enough power to score a knockout of Quigley, but you never know.
If Berlanga gets frustrated as he did in his fight with Angulo, he could resort to roughhouse tactics, which might lead to disqualification if he didn’t learn his lesson from his last fight.
Berlanga with back against wall
“When I say ‘get my feet wet,’ I don’t mean that this is disrespect since I’m not trying to say he’s a cab driver. I haven’t been in the ring for a year. So you know I got to go in and prove myself and show that I can hang in there with the top dogs,” said Edgar Berlanga to Secondsout about his fight this Saturday night against Jason Quigley.
“In my last two fights, I was injured. People don’t know that. I came from a bicep injury. People don’t understand how devastating that is. When you tear your bicep, the recovery lasts a year and a half.
Fighters take a year and a half without fighting to recover this bicep, and I came back in within four months and fought a main event fight against a guy that fought GGG.
“Then I fought Angulo back to back injured. So people don’t understand where my mindset was at. People took that and, ‘Ah, he’s not knocking them out. I went back in the ring and fought.
“I took this year off, and I’m back here in New York. When the competition steps up, I step up. When I have my back against the wall, I feel like that’s when I’m at my best. Right now, on the 24th, I have my back against the wall.
“When Edgar Berlanga has his back against the wall, and it’s me against everybody against the whole world, I feel like that’s when I perform at my best. On the 24th, I’m going to have my back against the wall. It’s either going to make me or break me.
“On the 24th, it’s either going to be, ‘This guy Edgar Berlanga, pack him up,’ or ‘Holy s**t, this guy is back. He ain’t playing no games. That’s why I say I’m taking this fight [against Quigley] very seriously because between that fight and the Canelo fight possibly happening,” Berlanga said.
Knockout not important
“That’s another fight too. Back against the wall, being the underdog with the whole world going against me,” said Berlanga. “As long as my IQ is right, the skies are the limit.
“I don’t necessarily think it’s knockout. I really just need to go out and show the world that this dude is back,” Berlanga said when asked if he needs a knockout of Quigley to get the Canelo fight in September. The monster is back, and ‘The Chosen One’ is back where he needs to be.
“I don’t want to put out, ‘I’m going to knock this guy.’ Nah, I’m going in there to handle my business. I’m going in there to hurt. I’m going in there to take his head off and do what I do best.
“I don’t want to cloud my brain with, ‘knockout, knockout, knockout,’ and then the knockdown doesn’t come. Then it’s, ‘Now what?’
“I want to go in there and do what I do and follow the game plan that me and my coach got, and my team got, and execute that. I don’t think he’s slipping. You get to a certain point in your career. How old is Canelo? 32, right?
“He’s fought a lot of tough guys. He’s been in with a lot of legends. You get to a certain point in your career where you got all the money, and you don’t take boxing as serious as you did five or six years ago.
“He’s still the king at 168. He has all the titles. You can’t overlook that man at all. He went in there and [defeated] Ryder. I know they said he was supposed to stop Ryder, but Ryder is a tough guy. He’s tough. He comes in to fight.
“I know people said he was supposed to knock Ryder. No, it was none of that. He’ll give everybody a tough fight,” said Berlanga.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LAvQiV2JhPo
Canelo fight possible
“Of course, Eddie put that out there first thing. ‘We get your feet wet and possibly another fight, and then we get Canelo or if you look impressive in this fight, then maybe we’ll talk a Canelo fight,'” said Berlanga when asked if Eddie Hearn said that if he signs with Matchroom Boxing, a fight with Canelo is a possibility.
“They didn’t have the same vision as we had,” said Berlanga asked why he didn’t stay with Top Rank. “Everything happened for a reason. People don’t understand.
“I had a suspension, and I couldn’t fight. They wanted me to fight in December. They were talking about me being main event in the Garden where Teofimo main event is.
“I got suspended, and I couldn’t fight. After the suspension, we wanted to go a certain route. They [Top Rank] didn’t want to go that route. They didn’t want to go where we wanted to go.
“They didn’t see the vision that we saw. So we was like, ‘Yo, we want out. We want the bigger fights. I want to prove myself. I want to go up there with the top dogs.’ This is what boxing is.
“Right now, I feel like I can’t just sit down and wait on them and fight another four or five guys that fight like Angulo. That’s what they wanted. They wanted me to fight four or five more guys like Angulo, and I was like, ‘No, I’m not doing that. No. I’m about to be 26 years old.
“‘I got my brothers over here, Shakur Stevenson, and you got Gervonta Davis and Devin Haney.’ These guys are fighting top-level competition. You got Ryan Garcia. These guys came from my era. We came from the same era.
“We were in national tournaments. These guys are fighting big fights, and I’m over here fighting these types of guys. No, I want the big guys. I want the big dogs. Now I got to step up,” said Berlanga.
EDGAR BERLANGA VS. QUIGLEY CARD
- Edgar Berlanga vs. Jason Quigley; Super middleweight
- Adam Kownacki vs. Joe Cusumano; Heavyweight
- Reshat Mati vs. Dakota Linger; Super-lightweight
- Khalil Coe vs. Buneet Bisla; Light-heavyweight
- Harley Mederos vs. Pedro Scharbaai; Lightweight
- Pablo Valdez vs. Demian Fernandez; Welterweight