A show with two main events finally has one solidified home.
Ring Magazine has confirmed that its July 12 card will take place at USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center’s Louis Armstrong Stadium in the Flushing Meadows-Corona Park section of Queens, New York. The 14,000-seat tennis stadium, one of the venues used for the annual U.S. Open, will host its first boxing event.
Officially headlining the show on fight night, England’s Hamzah Sheeraz, 21-0-1 (17 KOs), will move up in weight to face Brooklyn’s Edgar Berlanga, 23-1 (18 KOs), in a super middleweight contest between former title challengers.
The co-feature will pit Shakur Stevenson, 23-0 (11 KOs), and William Zepeda, 33-0 (27 KOs), in a WBC lightweight title consolidation bout. Stevenson, a 2016 Olympic silver medalist and three-division titlist from Newark, New Jersey, is the recognized full WBC title claimant. Mexico’s Zepeda holds the interim version of the belt.
Stevenson-Zepeda will take the lead during fight week activities, per a previous explanation from Ring Magazine, however absurd the concept.
A media-only press conference will be held Thursday at Palladium Times Square. Ironically, the kickoff presser will take place within walking distance of the outdoor makeshift location where Ring held its intimate U.S. launch show on May 2.
The isolated location for that event was met with industry-wide criticism. Access to the show was limited to invited media and VIP guests. A RING-branded barricade surrounding the site not only blocked public view but prevented pedestrians from freely navigating the high-volume area.
Moving its second U.S. show to a conventional facility will alleviate those concerns, while also providing the famed tennis center with a watershed moment in its first boxing venture.
Louis Armstrong Stadium in its present form opened in 2018, replacing the venue of the same name from 40 years prior. The state-of-the-art facility is equipped with a retractable roof, a failsafe in the event of inclement weather.
All of the card’s top four fighters fought in the first quarter of 2025 – Sheeraz and Stevenson on the same February 22 Riyadh Season show, Berlanga on March 15 in Orlando, Florida, and Zepeda this past March 29 in Cancun, Mexico.
Sheeraz is the only fighter of the abovementioned quartet who has not posted a win this year. The unbeaten contender fought to a draw with WBC middleweight titlist Carlos Adames. The decision was met with scrutiny, as most observers felt Adames not only deserved the nod but was flat-out robbed of a rightful victory.
While not an official defeat, the stalemate snapped a 15-fight knockout streak enjoyed by Sheeraz. It was also his last fight at middleweight and with trainer Ricky Funez. As previously reported by BoxingScene, the 25-year-old Sheeraz confirmed his permanent move to super middleweight and is now guided by former WBO middleweight titlist Andy Lee.
Stevenson appeared in the co-feature of that same card, and earned a ninth-round stoppage of late replacement challenger Josh Padley. The win marked his second successful title defense.
Berlanga returned to the win column with a first-round knockout of woefully overmatched Jonathan Gonzalez-Ortiz. The fight was his first since his lopsided defeat to super middleweight king Saul “Canelo” Alvarez last September 14 in Las Vegas.
Zepeda retained his interim WBC lightweight title in a repeat win over Tevin Farmer earlier this year. The volume-punching Mexican southpaw claimed a majority decision, slightly improving on his split decision win over Farmer last November 16 in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Zepeda suffered the first knockdown of his career that night, but he recovered to edge Farmer for the secondary WBC belt.