Israel Adesanya and Kelvin Gastelum will square off at UFC 236 in Atlanta Georgia to determine who will be the interim middleweight champion next in line to challenge Robert Whittaker for the official belt, and Whittaker did not hold back when asked which fighter he would match up better against.
Chris Weidman was possibly the most visible of Adesanya’s critics, as the former middleweight champion called Adesanya a “tad bit overrated” following Adesanya’s UFC 234 performance and doubled down in a follow-up interview on that assessment. Now, it is the reigning champion, Robert Whittaker, who shares the same opinion of Adesanya. And it is for this reason why Whittaker believes that between Israel Adesanya and Kelvin Gastelum, Adesanya would be a better opponent for him stylistically (Transcription via BJPenn.com):
“I think, stylistically for us, Adesanya matches up better for me,” Whittaker said on Ariel Helwani’s MMA Show. “I think I can get inside his guard and I can put heat on him. I think Gastelum is a hard fight because he’s a tough guy with a thick head and he would have just put the pressure on, put the pace on. I think Adesanya doesn’t like pacing like that in that sort of way, I think he would try and play a distance game with me which I’m very happy to do, but I’m very quick and I surprise a lot of people with that.”
As for the bit about Adesanya being overrated, Whittaker primarily bases this on what he considered an underwhelming performance against an aging opponent:
“I wasn’t impressed with his performance against Anderson,” Whittaker said. “If anything, I was impressed with Anderson’s performance against Adesanya. Anderson is not in his heyday anymore. He’s easily on his way out. Everyone can see that. And for Anderson to put up such a good fight… You know, I gave Anderson that second round. For him to put up such a good fight against a dude who’s on a tear with such a high-level striking skillset, and is running through people, I thought props to Anderson.”
“Adesanya’s very good. Don’t get me wrong. I just think he’s trying to build a hype train that doesn’t exist.
And much like Chris Weidman, Whittaker also questions whether Adesanya would have been in the position he currently is in had he fought higher ranked opponents:
“Get Adesanya to run the gauntlet like I did,” Whittaker said with a laugh. “Let’s see if he looks the same afterwards.”
Do you agree with Robert Whittaker? Is Israel Adesanya a better matchup stylistically for him than Kelvin Gastelum?
