Colby Covington agrees with Chael Sonnen that he should be next for Israel Adesanya.
Covington is coming off a dominant win over Jorge Masvidal and after the event, Sonnen said the fight that made the most sense is ‘Chaos’ vs. Adesanya. He believed it would be a massive pay-per-view success and given ‘The Last Stylebender’ has basically cleared out the middleweight division the timing worked. According to Covington, he says he would be interested in it and believes the scrap makes a ton of sense.
“Uncle Chael, man, that guy’s a f****** legend,” Covington told MMA Fighting. “Uncle Chael makes a very good point. Everybody was talking about Usman fighting Adesanya, this and that, Usman is a bad matchup for Adesanya — dude, I’m a bad matchup for Usman. I beat him in our last fight at Madison Square Garden. Why can’t I go up and fight Adesanya? I won’t have to cut one pound, I’ll just wake up and fight at my natural weight.
“That guy can’t stop what I do, and I truly believe that wholeheartedly. I do American wrestling, and this is mixed martial arts, blending the martial arts. And nobody can blend the martial arts like me. I put them all together. I’m a world-class striker, an A++ level wrestler. I’m unbeatable, and that style, people are going to see over the next couple of years how impossible it is to stop that style.”
As of right now, it doesn’t seem likely that the UFC will make the fight. Dana White said if Colby Covington wants it, he needs to take a fight at middleweight first.
However, should the bout happen, Covington is extremely confident he would not only beat Israel Adesanya but would dominate him.
“I feel extremely confident and I feel I would be a pretty good-sized favorite over him. That’s honestly how I feel,” Covington said. “He can’t stuff my shots, and if he stuffs it once, there’s going to be at least 20 or 30 [more coming]. I’m already, I think, second in the division’s history for most takedowns and I’m not even trying. You saw in my last fight with Jorge, I didn’t even break a sweat bouncing him around the octagon, telling him to lick my nuts, telling him he’s still my little son and I wasn’t even breathing hard. He was being held up by two people.
“My style against Izzy — he was getting taken down by Robert Whittaker. That guy has never taken a wrestling class, let alone being a D-1, high-level collegiate [wrestler] led by a master instructor like Dan Gable, who is one of the legends, one of the forefathers of American wrestling,” Colby Covington said about the Adesanya fight. “When you learn that type of style and that type of mentality, there’s just not going to be a person alive that can stop you. I used to dig ditches for fun just to get a workout. I go to deep, deep lengths to really push myself, my body and mind to be ready for any opportunity and any fight, and there’s just not a lot of people who can keep up with that. Izzy’s not one of them.
“When the going gets tough, you saw what happened a couple of fights ago when he fought Jan Blachowicz, he couldn’t stop it when guys keep attacking him,” Covington concluded. “I know I can do the same and I know it’s a great fight. Hopefully, the UFC can give me the opportunity.”
Do you think Colby Covington vs. Israel Adesanya should be next?