Israel Adesanya
Age: 28
Nationality: Nigerian
MMA Record: 12-0
UFC Record: 1-0
Notable Wins: Melvin Guillard
Notable Losses: None
Last Fight: TKO win over Rob Wilkinson
Fighter Profile: Adesanya has quickly emerged as one of the most intriguing prospects at 185lbs. His technical striking ability is something to marvel at with the level of precision, volume and power that he packs. Not surprisingly, he’s a former GLORY kickboxer. In his UFC debut he absolutely lived up to the hype with a vicious death-by-1000 cuts TKO win over Rob Wilkinson. Adesanya was taken down in that fight but managed to get up most times and on the feet he was everything as advertised. He still has to work on his wrestling, but so far has been everything he’s been advertised to be and this is a guy who could be a title contender one day.
Marvin Vettori
Age: 24
Nationality: Italian
MMA Record: 12-3-1
UFC Record: 2-1-1
Notable Wins: Vitor Miranda, Igor Araujo
Notable Losses: Antonio Carlos Junior
Last Fight: Draw with Omari Akhmedov
Fighter Profile: One of Italy’s top talents, Vettori has had some early success in his UFC career. He’s won two fights in the UFC, including a submission over Alberto Uda in his Octagon debut, and in his last fight had a terrific battle against Akdmedov which resulted in a draw. He had a number of submission wins on the European regional circuit and since coming to the UFC he has shown he has a solid ground game. His striking is not powerful by any means but he can hang in there on the feet against most opponents. He’s also shown he has a solid gas tank and can go the full 15 minutes. That being said, I haven’t seen anything out of him that suggests he’ll be a title contender anytime soon. I think Vettori is a solid fighter but ultimately I view him as someone who is destined to be a gatekeeper in the middleweight division, not someone who will vie for the title.
Fight Breakdown: I think Adesanya could struggled against a high-level wrestler, but I don’t view Vettori as that guy. I think Vettori is actually a pretty good young fighter but I feel like there’s a massive gap in the striking in this fight. I think Vettori may get some takedowns early but I think Adesanya will bounce up and on the feet he has a huge edge. Vettori is durable and has not been knocked out yet in MMA but if this fight spends a consideration portion of time on the feet he will get knocked out. Adesanya is ridiculously good on the feet and he has the confidence and skills to back that up. He reminds me of Bellator’s Michael Page in that he’s mostly fought overmatched opponents but is also someone who puts on incredible performance and punishes foes with their strikes And that’s my prediction, for Adesanya to continue to punish his foes and rack up his KO record with another finish over Vettori.
Prediction: Adesanya via TKO
