Edgar Berlanga has talked about wanting to use his jab to defeat superstar Canelo Alvarez this Saturday night, September 14th.
The Jab: Berlanga’s potential weapon
Berlanga (22-0, 17 KOs) and his team clearly watched Canelo’s fights against Floyd Mayweather Jr., Erislandy Lara, Gennadiy Golovkin and Dmitry Bivol and noted that those four gave Alvarez problems with their jabs.
The problem that could prevent Berlanga from following those fighters’ success against Canelo (61-2-2, 39 KOs) is that he’s not known for having a good jab. Berlanga is more of a puncher who uses his jab briefly while charging forward.
It could be difficult for Berlanga to make the transition from slugger to boxer for this fight, especially if his jab isn’t that good. If Berlanga throws a slow jab, Canelo will counter and possibly knock him out.
Canelo will defend his WBC, WBC and WBO super middleweight titles against #1 WBA mandatory Berlanga this Saturday at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas. The event will be shown live on DAZN PPV starts at 8pm ET/5pm PT and costs $89.99.
“Who are the four fighters that gave Canelo problems? Number one is Floyd Mayweather. GGG, fantastic stitch. He had a very underrated jab,” Chris Algeri told the Probox TV YouTube channel about fighters with big punches who gave Canelo Alvarez problems. “Erislandy Lara. He is a southpaw and has a good jab.
“Finally is Bivol, another guy with a good jab that changes distance. Those are the guys that gave him (Canelo) the most problems.”
Those fighters were/are on a different level than Berlanga. So it doesn’t seem realistic that he can have the same success that those fighters had against Canelo. If Berlanga hadn’t been in a rush to fight Canelo and gained more experience first, he would have had a better time transitioning to his game.
“I want him (Berlanga) to be the guy he says he is. I hope he doesn’t succumb to social media posts about what people are saying about what’s going to happen. I hope he lives up to all this hype that’s fun that he’s built this fight up for,” Algeri said.
Whatever Berlanga says he is, you have to take it with a grain of salt because he hasn’t proven himself against good opposition. He looked marginal in the five fights he had against B-level opposition.
“Look, I’m sure better than him. I have always fought with everyone, people say. If they really want to see the fight, pay me well,” Canelo Alvarez told DAZN Boxing channel about David Benavidez. “Yes,” said Canelo if he thought he was the best fighter in boxing.
Canelo has not said how much he wants for the fight against David Benavidez. He talked about wanting $200 million, but it’s not happening. The longer Canelo waits, the less money he will get when or if the fight does happen. Most would agree that Canelo’s popularity is declining because he is no longer fighting the opposition that the fans want to see him fight.
“Since the fight with Bivol, I’ve gone down (in the pound-for-pound lists). They don’t see that I’ve gained weight to try to be awesome, but that’s okay. I feel like I’m the best. 24,” Canelo said when asked how old he felt.
Canelo misses the point. The reason he has dropped down the pound-for-pound charts is not because of his loss to Bivol. He has dropped due to the quality of the opposition he has chosen to fight since that defeat. Canelo stopped taking risky fights and faced gimmes exclusively.
“Of course I have to take care of my body because I’ve been in professional boxing for 19 years. But I feel great, strong and fast. I feel four or five more years,” Canelo said, describing how much longer he plans to fight.
If Canelo fights the same level of opposition he’s been fighting lately, he could fight four more to give years, but he’ll have to avoid the good opposition like Diego Pacheco and Christian Mbilli because they’ll be very tough fights they can lose
