Was Alex Pereira’s rise in the UFC the demise of Israel Adesanya?

[Tweak896]

I think both Alex P fights were very stressful for Izzy and caused major burnout. Think about it, a guy who had beaten you twice before beats you again in the sport that you’re “supposed” to be better in. Izzy probably felt insane pressure for the rematch, probably worried his legacy would be ruined by that.

Not to diminish Strickland, I still think he’s always going to be a tough matchup for Izzy.

Izzy probably had insane training camps back to back for those fights. To be fair he did look good in both and it was the worst matchup for him. He just needed some easy softballs and Strickland wasn't it.

 

[andgonsil]

Izzy should take a rest after the Pereira fight

 

[eddi]

It seems as Alex gained notoriety in the UFC, Israel’s career began its landing back to Earth.
Israel was king of the world, until:

- 11/12/22 UFC 281: Alex defeats Israel for the third time in their combat sports career. Gets crowned middle weight champ and Israel also loses for the first time at Middle weight.

-4/18/23 UFC 287: Israel wins rematch to regain the Middle weight belt.

9/9/23 UFC 293: Israel loses the Middle weight belt to Sean Strickland who trained with none other than Alex Pereira for this fight.

Now, Alex is scheduled to fight Jiri for the next title shot while Israel just announced a semi-retirement.

I sense a correlation.

You forgot that alex defeated jan and strickland who both beat up adesanya really bad, and he was also landing hard leg kicks on izzy and sonning him got overconfident then got caught so he really stole ALL of izzy's swagger and shine tbh

 

[arcadeperfect]

I think both Alex P fights were very stressful for Izzy and caused major burnout. Think about it, a guy who had beaten you twice before beats you again in the sport that you’re “supposed” to be better in. Izzy probably felt insane pressure for the rematch, probably worried his legacy would be ruined by that.

Not to diminish Strickland, I still think he’s always going to be a tough matchup for Izzy.

The funny thing is, is that Strickland appears to be the far tougher matchup for Izzy than Alex. At least with the Alex fights he's always had success in landing his strikes and has even been able to rock Alex multiple times. Against Strickland, nothing worked for 25 minutes.

 

[vivi]

Izzy saying he’s going to take time off, but I think he’s going to be training like a madman. In his mind he’s probably envisioning an impressive comeback, and he can’t do that unless he addresses the holes Strickland was able to exploit, that takes time to do though.

 

[BermudaTriangl]

Izzy took the McGregor path.. Wealth and fame make you less motivated to train really hard.

 

[EYEKICKFACES]

Alex taking everything Izzy worked for.

 

[Dionysian]

Weird how people interpret psychology so completely differently.

I see a guy publicly saying he is taking a long break from the sport as an obvious mental departure from the sport. But others in this thread see it as evidence he'll be "training like a madman"

None of us know where he's at mentally but just weird that such different interpretations can be had of the same events