{"id":594052,"date":"2026-04-08T19:49:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-08T19:49:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/594052\/"},"modified":"2026-04-08T19:49:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-08T19:49:08","slug":"zuffa-boxing-signs-richardson-hitchins-and-edgar-berlanga","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/594052\/","title":{"rendered":"Zuffa Boxing signs Richardson Hitchins and Edgar Berlanga"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Zuffa Boxing <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/Zuffa_Boxing\/status\/2041894046545654115\" rel=\"nofollow\">announced this morning<\/a> that they\u2019d signed super lightweight champion Richardson Hitchins and super middleweight contender Edgar Berlanga to their roster ahead of planned summer debuts.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">\u201cThis is a major step forward in my career,\u201d said Hitchins. \u201cI\u2019m very grateful for this opportunity, and I want to thank Dana White, Nick Khan, and my manager, Keith Connolly, for giving a kid from Brooklyn the opportunity to fight on the biggest stage against the world\u2019s best fighters. With Zuffa Boxing in my corner, I\u2019m going to show the world that I am a pound-for-pound, generational fighter.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">\u201cZuffa Boxing is changing the game,\u201d said Berlanga. \u201cI\u2019m here for the biggest fights on boxing\u2019s best platform. I\u2019m here to put the super middleweight division on notice. \u2018The Monster\u2019 is back! Thank you to Dana White, Nick Khan, and the entire Zuffa Boxing team for believing in my talent. I also want to thank my father, Edgar Berlanga Sr., and my manager, Keith Connolly, for always guiding me in the right direction, and this move is no different. This is going to be a special journey.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\"><a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/ATokkers5\/status\/2041895963661312037\" rel=\"nofollow\">Two things immediately stand out<\/a>. One is that Zuffa doesn\u2019t recognize either of their divisions, going straight from 135 to 147 and 160 to 175. The other is that Hitchins (20-0, 8 KO) risks running into the exact same scenario as Jai Opetaia, whom the IBF stripped earlier this year for pursuing the Zuffa belt. Hitchins is presently on the clock to defend his belt against mandatory challenger Lindolfo Delgado, meaning Zuffa has to either negotiate with Top Rank or risk a purse bid if they want Hitchins to hold onto his title.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Or Hitchins could just ditch the belt and go to 147. The man\u2019s been clear about his struggles with the cut, which scrapped a planned defense against Oscar Duarte earlier this year.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Either way, something has to give. The press release claims there will be a Q&amp;A before UFC 327\u2019s ceremonial weigh-ins, but going by past history, odds are nobody will ask anything about these issues.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Zuffa Boxing announced this morning that they\u2019d signed super lightweight champion Richardson Hitchins and super middleweight contender Edgar&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":594053,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[571],"tags":[64,63,802,1920,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-594052","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-boxing","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-boxing","11":"tag-boxing-news","12":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/594052","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=594052"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/594052\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/594053"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=594052"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=594052"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=594052"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}