UFC 243: Inside the Octagon - Whittaker vs Adesanya

On today's show, we'll preview the UFC 243 title unification rebound between defending middleweight champion Roberts the Reaper Whitaker and interim champion Israel's latest style doubler Adesanya after more than a year Outside, the middleweight champion is back in the

octagon

and ready to continue. ended with the backing of a pro-Ozzy crowd, the Reaper will look to extend a nice nine-fight win streak, his opponents, however, will not be afraid of such an impressive record that boasts an incredible MMA record of 17 and no Adesanya has opened the way. on his way to the interim title with a walking crowd in Melbourne expected to break UFC attendance records.

There could not be a more appropriate setting for these two great champions. Hello and welcome to see him inside the

octagon

. Jungin along with Dan Hardy return to receive this great payment. -to watch UFC 243 for the undisputed middleweight title robert

whittaker

vs israel Adesanya Dan what a time for Australasian mixed martial arts another great show over 50,000 people will be there just shows how much the sport has grown internationally now yes and two Superstars also headline the bill, both with plenty of local interest. You know, the good thing is that when we enter a region and we have a champion from that region like Zhang Wei Li, you know she was crowned in China, yes, but. to have two fighters from the same region of the world competing for the United States, no I know it's going to be an incredible event, let's get into it, let's look at the facts and Stats Interim Champion Witek is going to want that new style of belt.

His shoulder is interesting on the rise a couple of years older, but I'm sure that doesn't make a huge difference between what we say about physical stats and exactly what you'd expect from his fighting styles. You know, Robert Whittaker is. He's an aggressive, forward-pushing type of fighter who likes to, you know, likes to stay pretty square with his opponents and throw them through a variety of strikes, but he always stays on the front foot and always stays active. during the fight under Sonya with whom he fights. like he's the tallest guy, you know the height and the reach advantage, he stays at distance, he uses the length of his shots really well to remind people that he's the tallest guy and you know, and I think how much The more he can fight, you know, he leans towards his attributes in this one are better and you also know an undefeated record, but even though he's undefeated, he's had some tough fights in the UFC, you know it hasn't been easy throughout, he's had a tough pass to victory against some guys who have really challenged him, so I think he's in a good place to be, you know, trying to unify the belts.

I think Whitaker is by far the toughest challenge so far in the UFC, though yes, and I like him. the way these stats, those of you looking at your house, are one by one because they match very well with the longest active streak, the second longest, but then it shows how close both fighters are and how they do their job, yes, this is the one. What stands out to me the most is that it is the second good takedown defense in middleweight history because he has had to defend many belts and now people will want to take him down, oh yeah, I don't know how many times Rob Wilkinson tries to take him down. but it was just a constant takedown effort and Adesanya always did well, no, but you know, the good thing is, because he comes from such a nice box in pedigree, yeah, he had to work on his takedown defense because most Of the times people are going to want to take him down, so it's almost like I have to refine my attacking skills for him and maybe, but at the same time I reinforced them with some takedown defense, which is obviously succeeding for him, yeah, well, let's stick with the interim champion.

You and Israel Adesanya talked about the kickboxing pedigree, he really has an elite level in the ring. He mania, he does it, he does it and I think it's fair to say that they are both punchers. I don't think it's that, you know they're both MMA fighters. Of course, but predominantly they both lean towards punching. I would say the difference between the two is Adesanya and I know I'm sure you get tired of people liking Anderson Silva, but there's something very similar about their style: it's less about the work rate or more about the threat of something happening, he constantly reminds you that there is a possibility that something terrible is going to happen and he reinforces it with his beautiful head movement, so that every time someone moves forward he takes two or three hits in his combination and misses and then , suddenly it feels quite exposed and in the first round Sonia will just read people, move and swipe and read and make you realize that he is the one in control of the range. of the fight then you'll start to drop some techniques just to see how he handles them, the body kicks the jab, a lot of faints and a lot of tricks and he doesn't have a regular way of moving either, he doesn't have a regular way of moving either.

Regular kick boxing bounces like you see most people, he stays on his feet for quite a while and he has this, it's very meandering the way he moves, he slides in and out of reach and you know fighters like Marvin Vettori, who is a big, strong and powerful athlete. who's all-around just couldn't touch him, couldn't get close to him and the more frustrated you get when you miss shots, the more you reach, the more you overextend, think Forrest Griffin against Anderson Silva, so chin and he got caught clean. and that's exactly what Adesanya does: that sliced ​​lick that gets out of the way and reminds you that you're exposed and you're on his terms and if he can reinforce that in the early rounds, he could cut some of Rob Whitaker's work rate.

Go down, like I said, because they're both forwards, they're both very different, I go down, you have that constant anticipation that something could happen with Rob Whitaker, something is always happening. Yeah, there's always something going on like the Knicks playlist. You can pick any Robert Whitaker fight and take a ten second clip of any round and you'll be hard-pressed to find ten seconds between punches. Yes, no matter what. It's just that he's going to keep touching it, keep touching it, let's get into it because it's just that it's a constant active work pace and if you fight someone like Ezreal Adesanya, you don't want to give him that space where he can start, you know? playing that witchcraft you want to be in his face keep touching him over and over again this is much more of a John Jones style game plan, you know, you see John Jones against Gustafson or against Anthony Smith, he never lets you start against your old Romero he has similar circumstances, you don't really want it to start because if it starts it's lethal, but if you stay on top of him and keep touching him, touch, jab, touch, that moment never begins, Israel understands that.

You never find that moment where you can relax in the fight and start preparing because he's always thinking about getting out of the way of your shots. I think you know if there are two of us we can start the fight with that kind of rhythm and just maintain it, everything else, from his game, it doesn't matter what direction he wants to take the fight, as long as he establishes that rhythm, that keeps Whitaker out. out of his comfort zone, sorry, Adesanya, if you understand that you have that space, that's when he can start preparing Whitaker and start walking things well.

If you follow the guy you know he's a crazy gamer and he talks about being player 1 and I have to agree in some ways, it's like perfect technique in a computer game. You don't have all that, that kind of peripheral stuff, if they throw a technique and it's perfect, guys, sometimes that's for Sonia, yeah, and that's how timing comes into play, that's where your kick box and experience is. comes into play. play, you know he added something to 8t, example of kickboxing and fire, but the important thing about that is that I think he has 85 fights, he has had 13 knockouts, so his knockout rates are not huge, but I mean there is a positive and a negative for that.

The downside is that he probably won't knock out Whitaker with a clean shot, which gives Whitaker time to use that pace. The good thing is that he has allowed him a lot of time in the ring, a lot of time against different bodies, different physical attributes, different skills. sets where you can start to use your timing and find confidence in ranges where people are uncomfortable, like let me jump back, there's a clip that he uses, he uses a really nice little step move and this is what I'm talking about. I'm talking. Syncing that there are times when a fighter steps forward you wait for the punch at the end of that time while it is on you instead of stepping forward and throwing the punch he will step on your weight and then throw the punch . because that moment in that broken cadence is what catches people when he gets into the intermediate range, you can see Tavares weighing in like he's threatening with an elbow, then he steps up to the range and catches it with a straight left to right, You know?

I mean, it's like he almost dropped the defense and then they called him, that's it, that's it and because the times are awkward too. Catch someone because they're blocked and you put your hand back down and he uses that awkward moment and he gets in range and you'll see what you're going to do or oil feints, which is another good example and this is the kind of thing that really You don't see unless you've been paying full attention to what he's doing, he loses a lot of those hip swoons and kicks like he's a threat, yeah, remember these threats here and then As soon as you think about it, he hits you with left eye all that kind of fainting and stuff, he just uses them to pick out his opponents weaknesses to see what they do with their hands when he moves forward to see what shots they want to counter with, don't you catch it exactly from here we go ?

This is it, so he's extending his lead hand with his hip feint. You can see the brace. You can see Tavares preparing his body for the body kick. and then comes the straight left. I'm going to play it one more time so we can fully appreciate it, so watch it at full speed, so he gets closer, he moves forward, he passes out. You see Brad Tavares prepare for the body kick and then he hits it. with the left straight look at the time there so he deals a beautiful moment, he did it exactly, it's enough to force his opponent to bite and then be exposed, that's pedigree and a punch you wouldn't get in MMA fights, you can not.

Play like this in MMA, even with a hundred amateur fights, you will be very good at MMA, of course, but this joy is, I mean, dealing with different styles of strikers and the reason I put this clip is because Anderson Silva made his debut in the UFC fight against Chris Leben. Chris Leben was a monstrous puncher and bully. We all loved the fight with Chris Leben, but he came crashing forward and Anderson Silva backed up and beat him when he arrived in Israel from San You. then he did that timeless and silver thing, it wasn't so clear because Israel Adesanya is obviously a slightly different fighter than Anderson Silva.

Anderson is not as reckless as Chris Leben, but the principle was still there, the Ambersons Silva, who was Israel, had to send you back. Back in the day he had that witchcraft and that feint and took out the weaknesses of his opponents, Sandhya had it too, but using it against Anderson Silveri was the guy who wrote that book on MMA that blows my mind. because now we know that not only does he have quick, accurate punches, but he can also set up guys that are good at setting up other people, yeah, so when it comes to someone who doesn't have that level of IQ attacking style, that's why.

I would tell you that it sounds like he's operating on a whole new level, yeah, and the only way to really reverse engineer it is to put someone in rhythm and not let them get into it, yeah, and I'm going to say this more than Once I Just Wanted celebrating those 25 minutes with that is one of the most incredible fights I have ever seen. I'm going to say it again, but for now we're going to go to the break that we see in the other one. welcome back to UFC inside the octagon where we are talking about the main poster of UFC 243 for the middleweight title below, where are we?

T well, we've talked about Israel Adesanya and Robert, wait, they could be very different strikers Anna Sonya I always had that constant threat that something could happen even though Nikki exactly, but her work rate is not necessarily there, while Rob Whitaker you can take ten seconds of any of his fights and at least they will be a strike in those ten seconds, it is constantly. touch, move and jab is always annoying with his opponent's timing and I feel like you know that if he's going to be successful without Sania on his feet, he has to stay within his range and continue to interrupt him so he's not at the whim of that meandering style. .

Dad Sonya has: We've seen Whitaker before inside the octagon and you've picked out a couple of idiosyncrasies about the way he prepares, it's surprising. I think it's worth reminding us because it's going to be very relevant to the short I'm sure, well the first thing worth mentioning is the way Whiticus stands, he stands quite square, something I like for MMA . I feel like we'll see more people doing this from now on. In it he stands quite square andeverything he does comes from a slight hip movement, most say someone is throwing a left hook, they will throw their left hook and turn their hip all the way towards it.

Whitaker turns it around and keeps his fists flat and palm down but he keeps his hips fairly square and that's not an anomaly because he does the same on the opposite side where he kicks. You know, we've talked about the kick he used against Curry before he did the same thing. his knee goes up and peaks and then breaks, that's the punch I was talking about, the one that floored Tavares, who went from a front kick to a left hook where he went straight in and caught him on the chin with it I mean, go back.

And look at the previous breakdowns that we've done because he's punching, I mean he's getting better of course, but the things he's good at is chaining things together, but there's that left hook again, that left hook that comes and then goes over. with the right hand it's because he doesn't turn much these hips it's pretty easy to back off it's pretty easy to change your mind mid-fight the combination and throw something different to suit your opponent which you have to do against that asagna if you throw the left hook and he doesn't land he doesn't want to invest in the right hand he wants to make sure he's safe he's not overextending but the techniques he uses so well here comes the kick I mean it's just perfect but it's these knee pads that you can see the knee comes to chest height and then the rest is a quick kick, there it is again, it's less about clearing the shoulder and clearing the arm to land and more. about keeping them going and with their rhythm and with that constantly touching and advancing and interrupting their opponents' timing, it can force how to tell you to move one way or another against the fence, which is where it starts and then establishes that.

The kick so the left took the right hand and the head kick with a left hook will be the keys in this fight. I mean Adesanya, as we know, has great head movement, but if he starts to back off and slide, I mean what was the kryptonite. friend and silver was the guy who threw one more punch at the end of the combination that wasn't expected because Whitaker doesn't extend too much because he keeps his hips pretty square the entire time. I feel like his combinations can be relatively infinite even if he misses a shot he won't extend too much if he misses the left hook he will still stop and be square with his opponent same with the kick if he misses the kick there isn't any very Thai spin to come back to to your stance He'll throw it up and break it and then he'll go back to his fighting stance, yeah, you know what I mean?

So yes, people coming off the left hook are supposed to come back from the right side, but since you're not overextending either way, you have more options again exactly exactly I mean pan Tavares, a great example. I know it's okay to start the playlist, but he flicks the kick into a lead left hook and moves forward with the left hook again. It's a very unusual move, the snap kick. It shouldn't be followed by a left hook because your body is retracting the kick, yes, but as soon as that hits, move the left hook forward and it's that kind of opportunity to close the distance quickly to come with a punch that doesn't. go on. your usual chain of punches that Adesanya relies on to predict his opponents, yeah, he needs a little bit of predictability in his opponents because then he can decide where is the safest place to put his head because he's not going to put his hands up, yeah, while with Whitaker. closing you in, forcing you to deal with a move equivalent to the fence panels and then deciding whether a left hook or a head kick will be the finishing technique.

There is much less play there for Adesanya, making him more dangerous at range. with Whitaker for a second and the last two fields of insecurity dominated by wrestling, yes, certainly, in that training room, now we must assume that that is the weakest area of ​​​​the descenders, we should see Whitaker use some of the that you have been using recently and fine-tune. for Romero and putting that in asagna, I wouldn't be surprised, you know, you think Whitaker is also a forward, he probably approaches the sport from a surprising perspective, which means that strengthening his wrestling and strengthening his running game will be something That will be a general approach in the future anyway, but when you've just done three training camps, Jacare Romero Romero, you have a guy that you don't want to end up with on the court because he's an absolute monster on the court and then you have another guy that can put to anyone on the floor with wrestling if they really want to and we saw Whitaker have great takedown defense even with a knee injury in both fights, that's a good point so we addressed it, yeah, very good move, good takedown.

Defense, good wrestling reactions, which tells me that in training camp he's been fighting hard and when you're fighting hard, whether it's a defensive or offensive training camp, you still benefit from both. If I'm struggling offensively, my defense will improve. automatically and vice versa, so it's arguable to say that Whitaker's wrestling will have improved dramatically by preparing for good fighters, yes, meaning we could now flip the script and Adesanya and not see Whitaker using takedowns. To a large extent, I mean that most of the time you will be in grappling range from the clinch. I imagine if he could huddle and come down against the fence and throw punches, he could expose the backside Adesanya might be able to pin him against the fence and start to wear him down, some takedowns will come out of this.

I don't have many clips because we haven't really seen much of Whitaker. with takedowns, but since we've seen a design where you fight on the ground so much in your fights, I feel like it would be obvious and dealing with the unpredictability is a way to take the fight to the ground, spinning kicks, jumping attacks, smother those attacks look at this beautiful, he steps in with a big left hook and manages to lock the leg, but dealing with the unpredictability will be a way to get the fight to the ground while he catches someone clean with the shot and takes Adesanya down.

He is excellent with his head movement, we know he is durable off the gas, in fact we know he can shoot in the first round and get back up and continue fighting to the distance, something he won't be able to do. What he does need to do if he gets knocked down is recover quickly enough to prevent Robert Whittaker from piling up on top of the landing field and punching, and while we haven't seen much of that due to his last three opponents, Witek has excellent ground and he hits very focused, he stays very square in his stance, just like GSP, as does Frankie Edgar and his entire body weight is on them, so think of a circumstance where Whitaker has his back turned to send him against the nearby, it has a short left turn. hook and he has the high kick and he has the right hand, if any of those three land and knock Sanur out immediately, Whiticus stands over him and unleashes a barrage of punches.

I am and it's the moments where Whitaker really looks like the middleweight champion of the world, if he's out there without sanur doing all the matrix stuff and you know, loading up his forearm for fireballs and that kind of stuff, that's the point at which he loses the fight because that's the point at which Addison, who starts writing the script well for both of them, so she has to take the initiative that she has to go in there and almost aggressively defend the belt, since You know, I mean, we have a title unification here, but Whitaker still needs to do it. fighting as champion, yes, and he needs to fight aggressively in this fight instead of against Romero, where he waited to see what Romero was going to do, he needs to continue that active work rate, but also look for the finish in this one.

You don't want to play for 25 minutes against Sandy because anything can happen, you know, as soon as you get out the door, as soon as you start having success, you need to continue to put your phone on the gas in response, especially with the offensive fight and We saw that from that stage Adesanya has good credentials for recruiting and keeping the fight on the feet, which is of course what he wants, but what have you seen to show that he can actually keep this going? Rob Wilkinson was a good example because in this fight Wilkinson didn't want any of his strikes and the more Adesanya was able to defend these takedowns, the more desperate Wilkinson became to get the takedowns, which forces you to work quickly defending guillotines while being aware. from when you're exposed, understanding how to manipulate someone's body against the fence to start turning the fence and start regaining position and even when you get knocked down, constantly posting and getting back on your feet is something that you're very, very good at. worst thing he can do if he gets knocked down, he just rests there because for Rob Whitaker to be very successful on the court he has to open up and hit if Addison, who is not trying to escape, not trying to get back on his feet, Witek and just continue unloading on him, whereas if he constantly stands up, he forces his opponents into this position where they're just exhausted, they've tried takedowns, they've failed.

We've knocked him down, he's back up to his feet now they're exhausted now his confidence is rising and now he's starting to control the octagon no matter what happens in this fight if he finds himself on the ground getting back up to his feet while the fastest possible is most preferable because I feel that even though Whittaker doesn't have the height and reach advantage, I feel that the strength and physique he has in this weight class will be something quite evident if they are blocked. Answer the last question and it will be about the occasion because this is a big old fifty thousand fight and they also think it could break the record.

Who do you think will handle that fight best? Because Alice Anya, I guess, is in enemy territory, I'm sure. She'll have plenty of support there, but it's Whitaker's backyard that handles that occasion best. I think they both handle it very well, and I think for different reasons, I think Whitaker handles it very well because, like I said, you know. two fights against all of you Romero, the second one developed because there was an injury and the first kick of the first round, so there was all that anticipation of well, you know it was a close fight, would it be different if I had had the fight?

You know, I hadn't been injured in the first round, then the questions that were asked in the second about time off, how is that going to affect Whitaker? You know, a lot of these questions we've had about Whitaker have come up before and I always felt like he handled them very well under Adesanya. I would say we haven't seen him deal with that in the past. I mean, the Anderson Silva fight would have been a big deal, but not like that, not even the Gastelum fight. I feel that way, but I feel like I only know Witt, I only know him in Israel.

I will assign you as the person he is. He feels like he was made for this stage, so I feel like he would feel like he isn't. She's not actually going to give birth. Know? perfect performance until he's on stage like that, yeah, so if anything, he's going to make them both better, yeah, it's interesting, this very different character, Rob Whitaker, is a family man. I think he now has nine under his roof in Asagna, enjoying the life of a champion. Yeah, very much a martial artist, not saying Whitaker isn't, but they definitely have two different approaches, which I thought, but they also did different approaches to the fight game.

I'm really looking forward to seeing this one, what event will it be, what do you think? Who do you have? Let us know the hash tag inside the octagon at UFC Europe. We're done for now, thanks Dan, catch us next time, thanks for watching.