In the
UFC Fight Night 209 co-main event, Robert
Whittaker proved once again that he’s a cut above most of the
middleweight division.
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The former champion picked apart fomer title challenger Marvin
Vettori for three rounds, ultimately winning a clear-cut
unanimous decision at Accor Arena in Paris on Saturday. Whittaker
has won 13 of his last 15 promotional appearances, with his only
two setbacks coming at the hands of reigning 185-pound king
Israel
Adesanya.
“I’m the most dangerous man in the division,” Whittaker said at
Saturday’s post-fight press conference. “Israel’s the champ. He
beat me twice, hats off to him for that. He’s a great fighter, he
really is. And I think stylistically he’s a great fighter, but I
still think I’m the most dangerous man in the division, because I
win. I win a lot and I make people hate fighting. I take the fight
out of them, because that’s what I do. I get in there and I get to
work.”
Adesanya knocked Whittaker out in the second round to claim
middleweight gold in the first meeting at UFC 243, but their
rematch at UFC 271 on Feb. 12 was much more competitive, though
“The Last Stylebender” emerged with a unanimous decision triumph.
Whittaker admitted that it took him some time to mentally recover
from that initial defeat.
“He knocked me out in the first one, and the second one was a
really close decision that, I’m not butthurt about it, but on
another day it could have been my win,” Whittaker said. “Mentally,
that’s massive. It’s very hard to explain how it feels to get
knocked out and lose your belt like that. It sucks. There’s a bit
of a learning process afterward, a bit of a picking the pieces up
process, and doubts and whatnot. I conquered most of them before
that second fight, and in that second fight, I conquered the rest
of them, and I think you could see that in this fight today.”
While Whittaker recently mentioned that a move to 205 pounds could
be a possibility, it’s clear that he’s still on top of his game as
a middleweight.
“I’m a fiend for progress,” Whittaker said. “I want to move
forward. I’m hunting that gold still. So I’m always going to
lurking around, just destroying who they put in front of me until I
get a chance to gobble up that gold.”
Whittaker figures to have a significant interest in the upcoming
championship bout between Adesanya and Alex
Pereira, which is set to headlined UFC 281 at Madison Square
Garden in New York on Nov. 12. A victory for Pereira could put
Whittaker right back at the top of the list contenders, but he’s
well aware of the challenge the champion presents.
“[Adesanya] is very good – he’s very good,” Whittaker said. “I
think his style of fighting, he’s a very good defensive fighter,
and he has the physical attributes to do it, as well as the talent
and the craft. He’s got the eyes, the head for it. He’s good at
what he does. He can avoid danger like nobody’s business, and that
makes him hard to dethrone, especially if you go to the points.
He’s very hard to dethrone.
“I think Pereira is interesting, because they’ve fought before, and
the small gloves add some element that’s different from their
kickboxing fights. And Pereira’s huge. He’s got the range and the
reach, and he’s very offensive with it, so we’re going to see that.
But they’re wearing small gloves. He hit him in the kickboxing
fight. Small gloves change things. You see it every night. The
small gloves change fights.”