Former UFC middleweight champion Israel Adesanya is one of the greats; however, his future seems to be up in the air.
“The Last Stylebender” has lost three straight and four of his last five fights. There has been no public statement from Adesanya on his plans for the future, but his coach Eugene Bareman gave some insight.
Bareman told Submission Radio that he had a good conversation with Adesanya, who was at UFC 314 to support his teammate, Alexander Volkanovski, who regained his title.
“The one brief conversation that he had with me in [Volkanovski’s locker room], he said, ‘Look, man, I think I’m going to fight again,’” Bareman told Submission Radio. “So those are the conversations we’re having, like, ‘Yeah, I want to fight again. I want to fight again. I think I’m ready to fight again.’ …
“It’s like we’re having conversations about whether he should fight again, or whether he feels like he should, or he has the feeling that he wants to, whether he has the hunger inside, and, that’s the conversations we’re having. So to be talking about, ‘Am I fighting this or that?’ No, you’ve got to bring it back a level.”
After an incredible run that included six title defenses, Adesanya lost his title to Alex Pereira at UFC 281, but won it back five months later.
That’s when the slide started.
However, Bareman thinks that “Izzy” doesn’t want to just fight; he’s hungry for a title run.
“I’m being patient. I mean, like, I’m cool with what Izzy does,” Bareman explained.”Izzy’s done everything he needs to do in the sport, went to the highest level. But the reality is, he’s lost three of his last four. He knows the kind of commitment and dedication that he needs to be in the sport. And we just had one of our best friends, a guy who’s the same age as Izzy — might even be older — win the championship of the world, and we both know from firsthand experience how hard that man works.
“Age is not going to matter to a guy when you work like that, mate. … I’m not privy to everybody’s camp and everybody’s work ethic, but that’s the hardest worker in the sport. Age is not going to matter, mate. I couldn’t believe how many people that I was hearing were writing Volk off. So we have a very close friend of ours, and we look at his work ethic and that’s the example. That’s the bar. That’s where we got to go, and as he knows, that’s where he’s got to go. And that’s a heavy, heavy commitment to dedicate yourself as much as Volk does. It’s a heavy, heavy commitment for any fighter in their prime, let alone one that’s in the twilight of their career.”
