Edgar Berlanga: I Fought Canelo Hurt, Sheeraz is Easy Work, "Boxing Fans Are Not Good People"

Edgar Berlanga says he took two cortisone shots in his arm to get through the Canelo Alvarez fight — and that Hamzah Sheeraz, the man who stopped him, "has no IQ" and was "easy work."

He gets into all of it with Andre Berto in Tampa: Canelo, Dana White, Eddie Hearn, Oscar De La Hoya, Fat Joe, Jay-Z, and the fans he says turned on him.

Fresh off the seventh-round TKO of Steven Butler at Madison Square Garden, "The Chosen One" sat down and held nothing back.

"The Chosen One" doesn't dodge much here. He walks through getting dropped in the second round against Butler and deciding right there it wasn't ending that way. He goes back to Bushwick — his father gone for seven years, the shelters, Benny Roman driving him from Brooklyn to the East Side and back every single day so he wouldn't miss the gym. He talks about the 160 amateur fights nobody credits him for, the 16 straight first-round knockouts that made him famous and, in his own words, slowed his development.

Then it gets honest. He says boxing fans are not good people, and talks about what it costs to carry a flag into the ring for people who question you. He talks about the loss to Hamzah Sheeraz and the stretch after it — the drinking, the breakup, the crying in an empty six-bedroom house, and his coach Marc Farrait refusing to let him hide at the gym. Four days of fasting. Opening the Bible and landing on Jeremiah.

And he talks about what's on the other side of it: signing with Dana White and Zuffa Boxing, linking with Jay-Z at Fanatics Fest, the "Baby Mamá" record that Fat Joe originally told him to shelve, the Creed III role he lost to a torn bicep, the WWE run he's pitching to Nick Khan, and exactly who he wants next — Chris Eubank Jr in London, Jaime Munguia, Jermall Charlo, Caleb Plant, and Sheeraz last.

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CHAPTERS

0:00 Cold open

0:45 Welcome to Square Up — live from Tampa

1:16 Steven Butler, MSG, and the weight of New York

2:36 The second-round knockdown

5:50 "Don't bring my son to the fight"

8:07 Bushwick: growing up Puerto Rican in Brooklyn

11:20 When his father went away

13:42 Benny Roman drove him to the gym every day

21:17 The 160 amateur fights nobody talks about

28:42 16 straight first-round knockouts

32:12 When the knockouts stopped feeling like his

35:47 "Boxing fans are not good people"

39:18 Carrying the flag for people who doubted him

43:51 Marc Farrait and the hardest gym in boxing

48:05 Buying himself out of Top Rank

49:31 Signing with Eddie Hearn to get Canelo

51:03 The dream that predicted the Canelo fight

58:34 "That fight with Canelo was my best fight ever"

1:01:02 "I gave myself 50%"

1:03:00 Two cortisone shots for the Canelo fight

1:07:04 Why the Hearn relationship ended

1:10:20 The Sheeraz loss

1:12:20 "He was easy work"

1:13:00 The stretch nobody saw

1:16:54 Four days fasting, and Jeremiah

1:21:37 Dana White, Zuffa Boxing, and the second run

1:28:23 The music, and Fat Joe telling him to stick to boxing

1:37:37 The Creed III role he lost

1:39:34 WWE, Damian Priest, and the character

1:40:43 Who's next: Eubank Jr, Munguia, Charlo, Plant

1:42:21 Raising Chosen

1:47:38 Andre's closing word

#EdgarBerlanga #SquareUp #Boxing #Canelo

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