Although an official date has yet to be announced, it’s widely expected that middleweight champ Israel Adesanya will move up to light heavyweight for his next bout in an attempt to become the UFC’s newest dual-weight world champion.
The man standing in his way is the recently anointed light heavyweight king Jan Blachowicz who shocked the MMA world when he defeated Dominick Reyes to pick up the vacant title just a couple of months back.
While he’s never been the most technically gifted, Blachowicz is as tough as they come, and he’ll provide a stern test when he eventually welcomes Adesanya to the beefier weight category. As the naturally bigger man, Blachowicz will have a significant size advantage when the two enter the cage on fight night, while the “Polish Hammer” also has good wrestling, an underrated ground game and he hits like a truck! If Adesanya’s bid to claim the 205lbs strap is to be successful, then he’ll need to be on his A-game when he takes on Blachowicz.
But a quick look at Adesanya’s last performance will tell you this is a guy at the very peak of his athletic abilities. Despite fighting as a professional kickboxer for some seven years, “The Last Stylebender” only made his pro MMA debut in 2012. What’s scary is that despite being the middleweight champion in the biggest promotion in the sport, this is a man who’s still learning his trade.
Every time he steps into the cage we see a more accomplished fighter, so it’s logical to assume the Adesanya who faces off with Blachowicz will be an even more formidable proposition than the one we saw dismantle Paulo Costa last time out. If that’s the case, he’ll simply be too quick and too slick for Blachowicz to handle. All the industry and heart in the world won’t be enough to bridge such a massive chasm in technical ability.
If Adesanya does get the job done, what does that do for the P4P rankings? Some might argue it doesn’t do much but moving up 20lbs to fight a man much larger than yourself should not be underestimated. Khabib is currently number 1 on the list, but if he follows through with his retirement then it’s likely Jon Jones will return to the top spot.
However, Jones’ last few performances have been uninspiring to say the least. Many believe he was lucky to get the decision against Reyes, while some even thought he should’ve lost to Thiago Santos when that one went to the judges.
Adesanya isn’t just defeating his opponents, he’s completely obliterating them. If he picks up the light heavyweight strap and does it in style, then we should have a new pound-for-pound king in town.
If Adesanya does take ownership of the light heavyweight strap that Jones recently vacated, perhaps that’ll be the catalyst to finally get the bitter rivals in the cage at long last. They’ve been going at it and calling each other out on Twitter for over two years now, with the insults becoming especially virulent lately.
For Jones, seeing a title he owned for so long being held by a guy he palpably hates would probably irk him no end, and it may be enough to finally get these two to square off and settle the score once and for all. With with the pound-for-pound crown up for grabs, there’ll be more at stake than just the title.