The UFC title fight between Israel Adesanya and Robert Whittaker may be over two months away, but the pair have already started trading shots, verbally at least.
The UFC middleweight unification fight was confirmed today for October 6, with the venue yet to be determined, but Adesanya wasn’t mucking around starting the war of words with the New Zealand-born Whittaker.
The Nigerian-born Kiwi slammed Whittaker for a meme showing the grim reaper, Whittaker’s ring name, and the Futurama character Bender, a joke about Adesanya’s ring name, the Last Stylebender.
"He keeps talking shit about me, the whole time and I’ve just been chilling, minding my own business so I can’t wait, I’m motivated, and I’m inspired and I’m ready to go," Adesanaya said.
"He makes memes now, my man makes memes, I mean have you see his Instagram, he doesn’t make ‘em, someone else makes ‘em but hey he’s been talking shit."
Whittaker didn't take the verbal jabs lying down though.
“What do I think about him? I don’t think about him, I haven’t been saying shit at all, I haven’t been talking shit at all, I put a picture up that someone else put up, I’m sorry," Whittaker responded.
"Don’t be sorry, I’m fine, hey, I’m just saying stay in your lane, like you say, he never talks shit but suddenly he’s the one putting memes up, keep that same energy, do what got you to the dance, you don’t have to try be anything else, keep doing what you’re doing and I’ll handle this, it’s alright.
“It’s cool, I think it’s going to be a cracker fight, I think he’s hyping it up really well and I look forward to October 6, I think it’s going to be fireworks."
Adesanya also took aim at Whittaker over his record of pulling out of fights after he pulled out of his title defence against Gastelum at UFC 234 in February with a hernia.
“I never call in sick, whenever I show up, New York, I could have pulled out, my last fight my knee got f----- up, I could have pulled out, but I never pulled out, I show up, I step out and I show out,” Adesanya said.
Both fighters did give some complements about the style of their opponent.
“It’s going to be a very difficult challenge, he’s a great fighter, he’s got a very dangerous skillset,” Whittaker said.
“I say offensively he’s got good blitz, I mean look at his last few fights,” Adesanya said before adding that Whittaker has been dropped before.
“Like I said, he (Whittaker) keeps getting dropped, my arse never hit the ground once, when I got rocked I came back like a champion, I dropped him (Gastelum) like four of five times, Adesanya said of his last fight, an epic win over Kevin Gastelum.
“So I know where my limit is and pushed past it and guess what, it’s still infinite.”
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