Midnight Mania! Khamzat Would Be ‘Massive Favorite’ Over ‘Poatan’

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Styles make fights: a statement as cliche as it is accurate.

Alex Pereira defeating Israel Adesanya might well end up a case study for that saying. Pereira is 3-0 over Adesanya across two different combat sports, and he’s the only man to ever stop him via strikes, which he’s now done twice. Clearly, “Poatan” is a bad style match up for “Stylebender.”

However, that doesn’t necessarily mean that Pereira is a bad match up for all the men Adesanya decisively handled. Adesanya’s success in taking down and stymieing Pereira in the third round has a lot of fans and analysts wondering just what would happen if a more established wrester dragged the knockout artist down to the canvas. Despite the big knockout win, some are straight up doubting Pereira’s potential against most other top Middleweights.

UFC commentator and retired champion Daniel Cormier isn’t quite in that category, but he does believe Khamzat Chimaev is a nightmare match up for the kickboxer. For that reason, Cormier thinks it would be best to immediately book the Adesanya rematch, rather than chance Pereira losing to a worse style match up and losing that option.

“If you schedule him and Khamzat right now, and Khamzat goes, ‘This is my belt, let me fight,’ Khamzat would be a massive favorite to beat Alex Pereira,” Cormier said on his “DC & RC” ESPN show (via Yahoo Sports). “Just because of the style. The style just does not match up yet and Pereira, he’s so young in his career that this (Adesanya) was honestly the ideal champion for him.

“I don’t know if you benefit from putting these two dudes against other people,” Cormier added. “Because I truly do believe that there are some very difficult matchups for Alex Pereira that weren’t as difficult for Israel Adesanya and that, to me, was shown in the third round when Izzy was able to control him once he took him down. You stick him in there with a grappler or a wrestler, he might get drowned out.”

As for Chimaev, “Borz” is flirting with title shots in two divisions. He’s already called for a fight with Pereira repeatedly, but he’s also rumored to be fighting Colby Covington next at 170 lbs. If UFC was willing to grant him a Middleweight title shot, however, it seems rather likely that Cormier’s prediction about the betting odds would be accurate.

Still, being favored to win and actually dethroning the champion are two very different things.

Insomnia

Do the disastrous results from today’s One Championship hydration tests call into question how seriously they were being taken prior to One’s move to Amazon Prime? Several of the athletes listed below did go on to make weight and hydration, but it’s been less than a month since John Lineker was stripped of his Bantamweight crown.

Ryan Garcia vs. Gervonta Davis sounds like it’s finally booked!

Adesanya quoting Muhammad Ali and Aang in the same post is a classic “Stylebender” moment.

A throwback of Dana White being angry at the truck — why not?

Renato Moicano as the breakout star of UFC 281 is not something I would’ve expected, but I am here for it.

The biggest difference is the smile.

Alex Perez vs. Kai Kara-France is a great Flyweight scrap.

Slips, rips, and KO clips

SUMO! It’s been a little while.

Sean Strickland beating up some dude in generic (read: cheap) UFC boxing gloves.

Sit on the head, crank the shoulder!

Random Land

Brilliant decision making.

Sleep well Maniacs! More martial arts madness is always on the way.