Former junior welterweight world titlist Chris Algieri will end a two-year layoff when he returns to fight this summer on a Triller Fight Club pay-per-view undercard.

Triller’s next event is the pay-per-view card headlined by Teofimo Lopez Jr.’s unified lightweight world title defense against mandatory challenger George Kambosos Jr. on June 5. Algieri will be on the Triller event after that, which is tentatively scheduled to be Oscar De La Hoya’s comeback on July 3.

“I have committed to Chris and (manager) Keith (Connolly) that he will be fighting on our next show after Lopez-Kambosos,” Peter Kahn, Triller’s chief boxing officer, told BoxingScene on Thursday. “You will be seeing a very strong lineup of entertaining boxing on the Lopez-Kambosos show and you can expect that moving forward on future shows, and Algieri fits into that category as a former world champion, who makes good fights and is looking to make one more run at a world title.”

Algieri said he has been training for the better part of the past year and cannot wait to fight again.

“I’m super exited to get back in the ring,” Algieri told BoxingScene from Boca Raton, Florida, where he has been training. “I’ve been in the gym for a year now. So much training, but at this stage of my career that’s a good thing. I had some time off with the pandemic, but I’ve been really focused on my boxing and I feel like there are a lot of great opportunities that are unveiling themselves now. The time couldn’t be better.”

He added that he was looking forward to be part of a Triller event.

“You take the opportunities when they come. I’m not a guy to miss them,” Algieri said.

Connolly said he was also looking forward to having him fight on a Triller show.

“Excited to see Chris back in action and get him back in title contention,” Connolly told BoxingScene. “(Algieri promoter) Joe DeGuardia and I thought Triller was a great opportunity for Chris to reach a younger audience, expand his fan base and bring new fans into the sport. We are so grateful for the opportunity Peter Kahn and the entire Triller organization has given Chris.”

Algieri’s opponent for the Triller event has not yet been determined.

“We are working through opponents. We want it to be a competitive fight,” Kahn said. “Chris was somebody I wanted to work with. I think Chris has a strong following, he’s fan friendly and he also fits into the criteria of what we are doing, which is we wanted to put on somebody who was willing to fight on our shows and who was a free agent or with a promoter willing to let his fighter be on our show.”

The 37-year-old Algieri (24-3, 9 KOs) has won three bouts in a row since a fifth-round knockout loss at welterweight in April 2016 to Errol Spence Jr., who won a world title two fights later.

After that defeat, Algieri did not fight for 2½ years, but he returned in November 2018 and won three fights in a row over the next seven months before going idle again, in part due to the coronavirus pandemic.

During his three-fight winning streak he outpointed Angel Hernandez over 10 rounds on a DeGuardia Star Boxing card in his hometown of Huntington, New York, and then won twice on Matchroom Boxing cards as part of a deal between DeGuardia and Matchroom Boxing’s Eddie Hearn.

Algieri then won a 10-round decision over Daniel Gonzalez on the Demetrius Andrade-Artur Akavov card at the Theater at Madison Square Garden in New York followed by an eight-round knockout of Tommy Coyle in a slugfest at Madison Square Garden on the undercard of the first Anthony Joshua-Andy Ruiz Jr. heavyweight title fight in June 2019.

Algieri has not fought since beating Coyle, although he has stayed involved in boxing as a commentator on various DAZN and ESPN+ cards.

Algieri said he will continue to fight at junior welterweight.

“That’s where I am most accustomed to fighting and I am still undefeated there,” Algieri said. “I never get too far off weight anyway.”

He hopes to eventually land a second opportunity to fight for a junior welterweight world title.

“Ultimately, I want another title shot. I want to be a world champion,” Algieri said. “That’s always been my goal. I’d love to get that title back. That’s always in front of my mind.”

Algieri made a name for himself when he got knocked down twice in the first round but came back to win a split decision over Ruslan Provodnikov to take his WBO junior welterweight world title in the main event at Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York, on June 14, 2004.

Algieri never defended the belt, instead parlaying that upset win into a shot at then-WBO welterweight world champion Manny Pacquiao. They met in Macau, China in November 2014 and Pacquiao won a shutout decision.

Dan Rafael was ESPN.com's senior boxing writer for fifteen years, and covered the sport for five years at USA Today. He was the 2013 BWAA Nat Fleischer Award winner for excellence in boxing journalism.