{"id":392370,"date":"2021-08-17T04:38:31","date_gmt":"2021-08-17T11:38:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/?p=392370"},"modified":"2021-08-17T04:38:31","modified_gmt":"2021-08-17T11:38:31","slug":"stephen-thompson-shares-his-thoughts-on-a-potential-awesome-matchup-with-israel-adesanya","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/mma-news\/ufc\/stephen-thompson-shares-his-thoughts-on-a-potential-awesome-matchup-with-israel-adesanya\/","title":{"rendered":"Stephen Thompson shares his thoughts on a potential \u201cawesome\u201d matchup with Israel Adesanya"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Stephen Thompson has said he&#8217;s open to the idea of a future match-up with UFC middleweight champion Israel Adesanya.<\/p>\n<p>Thompson, better known to the masses as &#8220;Wonderboy&#8221;, has had his fair share of ups and downs throughout the course of his time in the Ultimate Fighting Championship. He&#8217;s come within touching distance of the UFC welterweight title on multiple occasions only to fall short, and after his recent defeat to Gilbert Burns, many wonder whether or not he can ever challenge for the belt again.<\/p>\n<p>If he fancies a change, though, some are suggesting that he makes the jump up to middleweight in order to tackle Israel Adesanya &#8211; something he&#8217;d entertain.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Stephen Thompson on how he matches up vs. Israel Adesayna\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/WPdVTZ0llSk?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>\u201cI think it would be very fun. I think it would be an interesting matchup and win or lose with that, just stepping out there and fighting one of the best strikers in the UFC would just be amazing.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe\u2019s got the reach, man. he\u2019s got the length, he\u2019s got great timing, (he\u2019s) a scary opponent. But me being who I am and wanting to fight the best guys, the best strikers and me, you, know, considering myself one of the best strikers, why not? You know what I mean, I think that would be awesome. It would be (an) awesome fight, for sure,\u201d<\/p>\n<p><em>Quotes via <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sportskeeda.com\/mma\/news-scary-opponent-stephen-wonderboy-thompson-weighs-potential-fight-middleweight-champion-israel-adesanya\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Sportskeeda<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<p>From a technical point of view it&#8217;s pretty easy to see why fans would be interested to see this happen, and given how open Adesanya is to the idea of something fresh, perhaps it&#8217;d only take one or two middleweight wins for Thompson to make this happen.<\/p>\n<p><em>Do you think <a href=\"http:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/mma-news\/ufc\/stephen-thompson-criticizes-ufc-after-giving-colby-covington-title-shot-theyre-just-throwing-the-same-guys-at-kamaru-usman\/\">Stephen Thompson<\/a> will ever fight Israel Adesanya? If so, do you think there&#8217;s a chance he could walk away with the win? Let us know your thoughts on the karate king&#8217;s future down in the comments, BJPENN Nation!<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Stephen Thompson has said he&#8217;s open to the idea of a future match-up with UFC middleweight champion Israel Adesanya. Thompson, better known to the masses as &#8220;Wonderboy&#8221;, has had his fair share of ups and downs throughout the course of his time in the Ultimate Fighting Championship. He&#8217;s come within touching distance of the UFC [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":54478,"featured_media":279531,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false},"categories":[39449,10132,39610],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v19.7 (Yoast SEO v19.14) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Stephen Thompson shares his thoughts on a potential \u201cawesome\u201d matchup with Israel Adesanya | BJPenn.com<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Stephen Thompson has said he&#039;s open to the idea of a future match-up with UFC middleweight champion Israel Adesanya.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" 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