In a super middleweight match between dangerous and explosive punchers, Puerto Rico\u2019s Edgar Berlanga emerged victorious over Canada\u2019s Steven Butler when the smoke cleared after torrid fight in New York City on Sunday night.<\/p>\n
Berlanga (24-2, 19 KOs) returned to the boxing ring to face the knockout specialist Butler (38-6-1, 32 KOs) at Madison Square Garden Theater and demonstrated the year off would not be a problem on the Zuffa 9 Boxing card.<\/p>\n
It had been one year since Berlanga was knocked out by Hamzah Sheeraz for the WBO super middleweight title. The Puerto Rican slugger who signed with Zuffa Boxing chose Butler for his first fight back.<\/p>\n
It was almost a bad choice.<\/p>\n
Butler pierced Berlanga\u2019s guard in the second round and knocked him down for the count. It looked bad at that moment for the popular Boricua.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe caught me with a good shot. I recovered good. What can I say, its boxing,\u201d said Berlanga.<\/p>\n
Berlanga didn\u2019t waste time and erupted in the third round with a volley of blows that connected and had Butler rubber legged for the entire round. Though the Canadian fighter did not go down, he was in survival mode and managed to hear the bell for the end of the round.<\/p>\n
Butler looked for payback in the fourth round and it was clear that both fighters were hungry for a knockout blow. Though each connected, they both survived the round, with Butler maybe winning the round.<\/p>\n
In the fifth round, Berlanga looked sharp and in control as he used his jab and quick punches to keep Butler from jumping in with any combinations. Again Berlanga tagged Butler, but the Canadian proved resilient and took the blows.<\/p>\n
Both hard-punchers knew they could hurt each other and went for the killing blow. Berlanga launched a six-punch salvo and caught Butler who finally went down for the count. The Canadian got up to resume the round with Berlanga on the hunt.<\/p>\n
\u201cA wounded animal is dangerous. I knew if I hurt him but don\u2019t knock him out clean, he was going to come back,\u201d said Berlanga.<\/p>\n
Butler was told during the recess by his trainer that he needed to show something or the fight would be ended. Both fighters stood in the middle of the boxing ring and unleashed furious blows, with Berlanga landing a few clean blows. The referee jumped in between the fighters and tackled Butler to the floor and underneath the ropes. The fight was over at 1:19 of the round.<\/p>\n
Berlanga was declared the winner by technical knockout at 1;19 of the seventh round.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a learning experience. We fought a dangerous fighter, a true knockout puncher,\u201d said Berlanga. \u201cI want to fight the best.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
Other Results<\/p>\n
Former world champion Richardson Hitchins (21-0, 8 KOs) used his height, speed and razor sharp jab to neutralize Mexico\u2019s Ricardo Salas (24-3-2, 18 KOs) in a 10 round welterweight clash. Salas had some moments, but he couldn\u2019t solve Hitchins\u2019 jab and that allowed the former super lightweight champion to move up in weight and win every round against Salas 100-90 three times.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe guy was tough, he kept going,\u201d said Hitchins. \u201cI showed what I can do; box.\u201d<\/p>\n
In perhaps the most competitive fight of the night, Washington D.C.\u2019s Jalil Hackett (13-1) defeated the dangerous Ukrainian middleweight contender Sergii Derevyanchenko (16-7) in a 10-round shootout. Despite the lack of experience, Hackett used his athleticism and energy to out-fight Derevyanchenko, who had great success with overhand rights. Hackett took every blow and returned fire to win by unanimous decision. The scores were 98-92, 97-93, 96-94 for Hackett.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was itching to get him later,\u201d Hackett said. \u201cThat\u2019s a guy dog over there.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ponderous heavyweights Vladyslav Sirenko (23-1, 20 KOs) and Otto Wallin (28-4, 16 KOs) belted each other for nine round until the Ukraine\u2019s Sirenko unloaded a right and left that rendered Wallin unconscious at 2:59 of the 10th and final round.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In a super middleweight match between dangerous and explosive punchers, Puerto Rico\u2019s Edgar Berlanga emerged victorious over Canada\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":826692,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[571],"tags":[64,63,802,105660,33003,8201,399796,102536,344166,50699,399797,85,163952,25288,25290,399704],"class_list":["post-826691","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-boxing","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-boxing","tag-david-a-avila","tag-edgar-berlanga","tag-hamzah-sheeraz","tag-jalil-hackett","tag-otto-wallin","tag-ricardo-salas","tag-richardson-hitchins","tag-sergii-derevyanchenko","tag-sports","tag-steven-butler","tag-the-sweet-science","tag-tss","tag-vladyslav-sirenko"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/826691","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=826691"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/826691\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/826692"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=826691"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=826691"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=826691"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}