UFC 287: Israel Adesanya revels in stunning KO of Alex Pereira, mocks his son with Octagon flop – ‘I’m petty’
- Adesanya gains revenge over his personal bogeyman in Miami, flattening Pereira in second round to reclaim UFC middleweight title
- ‘I looked for his kid, just to remind him,’ the champ says, recalling incident from 2015 kickboxing fight with the Brazilian
Israel Adesanya gained revenge over his personal bogeyman on Saturday night in Miami, flattening Alex Pereira with a stunning KO to reclaim the UFC middleweight title in emphatic fashion.
After beating him twice in their kickboxing days, the Brazilian had hunted down “The Last Stylebender” and followed him into the world of mixed martial arts, shocking him with a fifth-round TKO last November in New York City to end Adesanya’s dominant three-year reign over the division.
With his legacy on the line, Adesanya looked in trouble again, covering up against the Octagon fence late in the second round. Pereira swooped in for the kill, in what would have been a carbon copy of the flurry that ended their previous bout in Madison Square Garden.
But Adesanya sprang out with a vicious right hook that caught Pereira completely off guard, and wobbled him. Adesanya needed no second invitation to finish the job, and brushed the hulking 35-year-old’s temple to send him crashing down to the canvas.
“I played possum,” Adesanya said at the post-event press conference, comparing the knockout to Muhammad Ali’s famed “Phantom Punch” on Sonny Liston.
“I knew my leg was hurt, so I went southpaw. I knew this was it – possum, possum, possum. I set traps, man. After that rope a dope moment I saw him lying flat on the ground, frozen like Elsa.”
The 33-year-old Nigeria-born New Zealander followed up with a hammer first but “Poatan” was already out cold – a sight almost no one would have predicted seeing this week.
“I could have just let him slide, but nah, f*** that º– he would come for the kill,” Adesanya added. “The honourable thing I could do was put him out of his misery.”
Adesanya – understandably – took a hell of a victory lap, first firing off three pretend arrows into his vanquished foe as he stood over his lifeless body, mocking Pereira’s pre-fight “archer” walkout stance.
Then, he pointed to somebody in the crowd, and dropped down to the canvas, as if he himself had been knocked out. It turned out he was getting some payback on Pereira’s son, who was watching ringside at the Kaseya Center.
“I’m petty, bro,” Adesanya said in his post-fight press conference, when asked about the moment. “I remember.
“First time he knocked me out in Brazil [in Glory Kickboxing], his son came into the ring and then started to lie dead next to me. I’m like, ‘you [expletive] little a******. I’ll whip your a** if your dad doesn’t do it for you.
“But I looked for his kid and pointed at him and I saw him and was like, ‘hey, hey, hey’ [mimics dropping down], just to remind him.”
Despite a heated rivalry that has spanned nearly a decade, there was a fist bump in the cage and a show of respect behind the scenes in a video that quickly went viral.
“We’re cool,” Adesanya added. “I saw him backstage. He’s a great champion, a warrior. I’m the antagonist in his story. He’s a beast coming from where he’s come from, to get to where he’s gotten now and taking me out the way he has is a beautiful story for him.
“But it’s not about his story – it’s my story, which is history.”
In keeping with the theme of the night, Adesanya also revelled in his moment in front of the media, some of whom he felt had written him off.
“Type your s***,” he shouted to press row as he left the Octagon with the belt around his waist.
“I know myself,” he added backstage, back in front of the same reporters. “If you know yourself, no one else can tell you who are you.
“Most people let that negative talk weigh on them. I’ve been through too much in my life to let that stuff weigh me down – whenever it creeps in, I tell it to shut up and keep going.”
