‘Demolition of the year’: Dana White labels Israel Adesanya as the next big UFC superstar

Much is changing in the sports landscape of 2020, but in the UFC two things remain very similar.

Israel Adesanya keeps winning and UFC president Dana White continues to speak of his middleweight champion as if he is on his way to becoming the face of the world’s largest MMA promotion.

Adesanya, who fights at Auckland City’s famous Kickboxing gym, has moved his MMA record to a perfect 20-0 with the second defense of his UFC middleweight belt by stopping previously undefeated Paulo Costa by TKO in the second. assault on Sunday (NZT).

Before the fight, White was predicting a contender for the fight of the year. But such was the dominance of the Nigerian-Kiwi fighter’s impressive performance that White called it the “demolition of the year” after the fight.

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“I think he’s going to be the next big superstar here, especially after tonight’s performance,” White said of Adesanya.

“The boy is an absolute stud.”

Without revealing the pay-per-view numbers, White claimed the fight will have broken multiple records.

‘The Last Stylebender’ has previously been compared, by White, to Conor McGregor and while there are several other massive names on the UFC roster, if Adesanya isn’t the greatest of all now, it seems only a matter of time until he is. .

The pre-fight gaze between Adesanya and Costa at the weigh-in was the most watched in UFC history.

When UFC 253 began, White said the video had registered 1.5 million more views than the look down on the Conor McGregor and Khabib Nurmagomedov fight.

White also said that all of the UFC social media numbers prior to the Adesanya and Costa fight had been off the charts, one more indication of how large he predicts the pay-per-view numbers will have been.

Some of that could be attributed to Covid-19’s current crippled sports landscape, but there’s no question about Adesanya’s global reach, which will only have grown even further given its brutal dismantling of Costa.

Now undefeated in nine fights since joining the UFC, the outspoken Adesanya has the game outside the Octagon to match the brilliance of his punches on him.

Following his latest win, which came at UFC 253 at ‘Fight Island’ in Abu Dhabi, it’s hard to see who could seriously threaten Adesanya’s control of the middleweight division.

After the fight, White praised Costa’s toughness and skill, but said Adesanya was just on another level.

“Costa is so good, normally he’s a savage but Adesanya shut him down tonight,” White said.

After repeatedly attacking Costa’s front leg for most of the fight, Adesanya dropped him with a left hook to the temple before delivering a barrage of hammer fists to end the fight 3:59 in the second round.

“Adesanya just got to work. He took it apart piece by piece … he made it look really easy,” White said.

White was surprised that Costa did not attempt a clinch, but said Adesanya forced him into a “very strange fight” for the challenger in which he was unable to cause any difficulties for Adesanya.

“Costa tends to chase people like they owe him money.

“I think he landed a punch in this fight.

“He wasn’t really throwing punches at all, just kicks,” White said.

But White reiterated his belief that Costa’s ineffectiveness was due to Adesanya’s skill.

Adesanya earned a $ 50,000 (NZ $ 76,501) bonus for the night’s performance, but given his purchasing power as a global superstar, that’s almost irrelevant to the undisputed UFC middleweight champion.

“He absolutely dismantled it and easily won the fight,” White said as he continued to rave about the performance.

“The first three kicks to the calf broke his leg, then he hit him right on the side of the knee and he had a big welt on his knee and then on the shin of his eye,” White said pointing to a cut Adesanya opened in the Costa’s eye.

After his title defense, Adesanya said he wanted Jared Cannonier, who is on a three-game win streak and ranked No. 3 in the middleweight division, if he can surpass former champion Robert Whittaker.

Cannonier fights Whittaker at UFC 254 on October 24, and White confirmed that the winner of that contest will likely be Adesanya’s next.

Whittaker lost his belt to Adesanya in 2019 when the interim champion became the undisputed when he stopped Whittaker early in the second round.