‘It’s not good for the sport’ – Dan Hardy criticizes Israel Adesanya’s ‘crass’ UFC 253 celebration

Photo by Josh Hedges/Zuffa LLC

“It was unnecessary and it was crass.” 

Some would say Israel Adesanya may have taken it a little too far with his post-fight celebration at UFC 253. After stopping Paulo Costa in the second round to retain the middleweight title, “The Last Stylebender” behaved in a manner that wasn’t exactly PG-13.

And then, there was this.

“Borrachinha” wasn’t pleased with the champ’s antics, and he now wants to exact his revenge. Former UFC title contender turned analyst Dan Hardy shares the same sentiment, which he shared in his exclusive Tuesday scrum in Fight Island.

“It was crass, is the truth,” Hardy told media members (via MMA Fighting). “It was unnecessary and it was crass. It’s not good for the sport to be seeing those things, but at the same time we see a lot of the superstars they stand out, they create headlines because of the thing that they do.

“[Adesanya] was urinating on the octagon in his UFC debut. We shouldn’t be surprised by these things.”

As a former active competitor, “The Outlaw” completely understands that post-win rush. Ultimately, he singled out Adesanya’s actions as something that goes against the “spirit of martial arts.”

“There’s a lot of animosity between these guys and we do act out when we’re in these scenarios,” Hardy explained. “When your adrenaline’s up, you’ve just won the fight, you’ve got all this energy. How many times do you see people doing terrible dances after fights and stuff? I’ve done it myself.

“You don’t know what you’re saying in interviews because your adrenaline’s going, you’re just ‘blllaaaaah!’ It happens. Sometimes it’s difficult to keep control of yourselves in those circumstances, but that’s when you see someone like that and you kind of think, well, it wasn’t in the spirit of martial arts and really that’s what we want to be seeing, to represent the sport as a whole. But ultimately, these people have to be their individual selves.”

While most fans would appreciate Adesanya showing his personality, a handful of MMA personalities seem to have a problem with the way he conducts himself. Recently, UFC president Dana White also expressed his dislike towards the champ’s walkout dance routine, which unfortunately didn’t happen on Saturday night.