Edgar Berlanga (22-0, 17 KOs) is all set to challenge pound-for-pound king Saul “Canelo” Alvarez (61-2-2, 39 KOs) for his WBA, WBC and WBO super middleweight titles in September. While Berlanga is a phenomenal boxer, his achievements are often obscured by an infamous incident where he shadowed the ‘Baddest Man on the Planet” by attempting to bite Roamer Alexis Angulo (27-3, 23 KOs) during their fight in 2022. ‘The Chosen One’ recently came clean about the incident and opened up about how the entire fiasco affected him mentally.
Berlanga was a guest on the latest episode of The Breakfast Club. In conversation, he was asked about critics’ comments that he did not deserve the Alvarez fight.
“Even if, quote-unquote, I deserved the fight. They’d still be talking s---. I’m probably like, between Shakur (Stevenson), Devin (Haney), Ryan (Garcia), and who else is out there, me. There’s five of us that everybody hates in boxing. Been like that for a while. I’m always going to be like this bro,” he said.
When asked about why people would have the perceived notion about him, Berlanga mentioned that his quintessential Brooklyn-ness might be to blame. He continued by stating that people considered him “cocky” and are always quick to talk about his jewelry and watches. While Berlanga has not taken the comments to heart, he confessed the flak that he received after the Angulo fiasco affected him mentally. “Before when I first started, I went through a depression bro. Crazy backlash like that when I did the Mike Tyson bite against Angulo. They were trashing me for like eight months,” he said.
Berlanga further reasoned that he did so because Angulo had pulled a Ryan Garcia by coming in overweight. “And then during the fight, I have this dude on YouTube who is a fan of mine, who broke down the whole ten rounds on how dirty Angulo was fighting. He split me open with an elbow. All I felt were headbutts and elbows the first four rounds,”he said. “And then it was just a, come here, AARGH (Biting Action).”
“You Bleed Like Me”
Meanwhile, Berlanga expressed confidence in his upcoming fight against Alvarez. Talking to Fight Hub TV, he even stated that he was different from the other opponents that Alvarez has faced.
Berlanga mentioned that he was dropping heavyweights during training sessions. Moreover, he added that he had ex-felons on his team, which, in turn, helped him build the “killer instinct.”
“You bleed like me, you breathe the same air I breathe, you walk on the same Earth that I walk on, he’s nothing different. He’s not a robot from outer space. He’s a human. It’s the mental, it’s the mentality,” he said. “I got to go out there and just do what I do. Do my thing and just turn up for the city and put my name in the history book like a legend.”
