Israel Adesanya Reveals Why He Deserves Next Title Shot

Rising UFC middleweight contender Israel Adesanya doesn’t sound like he wants to take Dana White’s advice.

The rapidly ascending future star passed the toughest test of his UFC career when he dominated previous No. 6 Derek Brunson in the main card opener of Saturday’s UFC 230 from New York. The first-round TKO will put Adesanya in the conversation for a title shot in the somewhat confusing middleweight title picture.

A lot of “The Last Stylebender’s” ability to run through Brunson was due to his takedown defense. He may be a kickboxing veteran known for his lethal striking, but Adesanya says he’s a complete fighter. He touched on that part of his game after the fight (via Bloody Elbow), revealing he focused on rounding out his skillset:

“I’ve seen too many street fights. 80 percent of street fights end on the ground. I never want to feel vulnerable in any situation. I never want to feel like another guy can have me. A lot of guys won’t even dare step in here. A guy like James Toney had the balls to step in here.”

Adesanya then moved on to what he believes should be next for him. White believes he should take it slow after four fights in his first year in the UFC. But that view if the opposite of Adesanya’s plan. Jacare Souza seems to be the next contender to the winner of Robert Whittaker vs. Kelvin Gastelum. That fight is expected take place in Australia in early 2019.

But “The Last Stylebender” isn’t down with that. Souza has lost to both of those fighters, so the rising knockout artist says those match-ups are old news. The contenders below him – Yoel Romero and Luke Rockhold – also have their own issues making it to the fight. In his opinion, that puts him in place for a title fight:

“Jacare’s lost to both Kelvin (Gastelum) and Robert (Whittaker). Who wants to see that? You have Yoel (Romero). Unreliable. And also, he missed weight. Yoel doesn’t make weight all the time. Rockhold makes weight, but same thing, he pulls out a lot. Unreliable. If Robert wins it just makes so much sense.“

No matter what goes down, it seems Adesanya will get a UFC 185-pound title shot at some point no matter what. It could be next, or it could be after one or two more high-profile give him more experience versus the truly elite middleweights.

The future is bright for “The Last Stylebender.” The UFC understands they should unleash him as a PPV star only when the time is right.