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We are a couple days removed from the UFC 243 pay-per-view (PPV) event which saw Robert Whittaker cough up his Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) Middleweight title after getting knocked out by Israel Adesanya last Saturday (Oct. 5, 2019) in Melbourne, Australia (highlights).
While Paulo Costa will be the first man to get a crack at dethroning “The Last Stylebender,” Jared Cannonier is likely the next man up after that. Winner of three straight since dropping to 185 pounds, “The Killa Gorilla” believes one more win will take him to a championship fight…and he knows the quickest way to get there.
“Anybody ahead of me gets me closer to a title (fight). I would say a fight with Whittaker would put me closer to a title fight than a fight with any of those other guys. If I were to rank them or put them in a number or anything,” said Jared during a recent interview on The Ariel Helwani MMA Show.
“So I would say Whittaker because he just lost the title. He didn’t look bad in his efforts. I thought he looked great. I think he will only look better especially for being off as long as he did. I think he will do better in his next outing.”
For our money, we’d prefer Cannonier to face off against Yoel Romero next. It’s a suggestion Jared himself isn’t ruling out.
“Everybody is mentioning a fight against Romero. I don’t care either way, as long as it moves me forward and closer to the title. So if it has to be one fight that is going to get me to the title, then the one that will get me there.”
Jared is fresh off a knockout win over Jack Hermansson last week at UFC Fight Night 160 in Copenhagen, Denmark (highlights). It’s his third straight knockout win after suffering back-to-back defeats at 205 pounds. His run thus far in his new division has been good enough to earn him a top five ranking, leaving him one win away from punching his ticket to the big dance.
That said, who would you prefer Jared face next: Whittaker or Romero?