UFC 259 LOSS WON'T BLOCK ADESANYA'S PATH
Transcendent greatness proved elusive for Israel Adesanya at UFC 259.
Going up in weight to take on light-heavyweight champion Jan Blachowicz, Adesanya — the UFC's middleweight king — fell short, losing a clear unanimous decision to the Polish veteran.
What exactly did Adesanya lose in the grand scheme of things? He obviously lost the fight, but generally managed to hold his own against a bigger opponent. His in-octagon reputation probably doesn't take much of a hit.
A lucrative fight against Jon Jones is probably off-the-table because of Saturday night's result, and that will be disappointing. Adesanya is just going to return to middleweight and continue brandishing his reputation as the dominant 185-pound fighter of his era, though. That's a pretty decent Plan B.
Adesanya took a risk and it didn't pay off. Any right-minded fan or analyst is going to look at that and respect it, especially if he goes back down to 185 pounds and continues to dominate.
Here are other take-aways from a fun night in Las Vegas:
1. CREDIBILITY ESTABLISHED
Blachowicz won the UFC's light-heavyweight title by beating Dominick Reyes. He's the rightful 205-pound champion.
But since that title fight happened after Jon Jones vacated the belt to pursue heavyweight glory, it hasn't always felt like Blachowicz has a ton of credibility. Jones could just come back and reclaim his place atop the light-heavyweight hierarchy, right?
Maybe there's some truth to that, but Blachowicz is on a five-fight winning streak that includes wins over Adesanya — who has generally looked pretty unbeatable at middleweight — Reyes, who nearly beat Jones, Corey Anderson, Jacare Souza and Luke Rockhold.
That's a hugely impressive streak, and it's not his fault that Jones took himself out of contention for the belt.
If Jones decides to return to light-heavyweight, so be it. Until that happens, though, Blachowicz has earned the right to be called champion.
2. STRAIGHTFORWARD PATH
We touched on Adesanya a fair bit in the intro, but it's pretty easy to chart his path forward.
He'll return to middleweight and fight the No. 1 contender. Then he'll do it again. And again.
Who is next? It probably should be a rematch with former champion Robert Whittaker, although Darren Till's name keeps getting tossed around and that's a fight Adesanya is quite openly interested in.
There's no bad option, really, but it's great that the middleweight division will have its top draw back.
3. NO DEBATE
The ease with which Amanda Nunes dealt with Megan Anderson would have been surprising if this wasn't Nunes we were talking about.
The women's bantamweight and featherweight champion was utterly dominant in defending her 145-pound belt. She needed barely two minutes to dispatch the Australian challenger, locking in an armbar for the win.
There just aren't that many new things to say about Nunes. She's the greatest women's fighter in MMA history and there's a strong argument to be made that she's the most dominant fighter the UFC has ever seen, period.
Who's next for her? Who could you even build an argument for conceivably challenging Nunes? Valentina Shevchenko is the only real option, but Nunes has already beat her twice.
It may be the only fight to make, though. Nunes is just that good.
4. UNFORTUNATE ENDING
Aljamain Sterling didn't want to win the title this way.
In the fourth round of his fight with bantamweight champion Petr Yan, Sterling was on the receiving end of a knee to the head that left him dazed and in no condition to continue fighting. The referee rightfully disqualified Yan, meaning Sterling became champion.
Yan was winning the fight and the knee was completely inexcusable. He'll get his rematch, but nobody should feel sorry for him.
The most toxic corners of social media have been critical of Sterling for not continuing, as if any of them would take a knee to the face and get back up to take more damage.
It was a disappointing ending to a fun fight, but Sterling did nothing wrong. He is the bantamweight champion now.
5. COUNTDOWN IS ON
There were a lot of other really fun fights on Saturday. Islam Makhachev's defeat of Drew Dober deserves to be talked about, for example.
But we need to look ahead to March 27 when Francis Ngannou challenges Stipe Miocic for the heavyweight title. It's as anticipated a fight as we're likely to get all year, and it will be fascinating to see how much Ngannou has grown since his loss to Miocic at UFC 220.
If Ngannou wins, he's primed to become a global star. If Miocic wins, it reaffirms his place atop the UFC's list of all-time heavyweight greats.