ISRAEL ADESANYA SHOULD RETIRE NOW BEFORE THE DOWNHILL ROLLS — OR WE KISS THREE YEARS OF HIS PRIME GOODBYE!

Mate, I’ve never seen so much glossing over the damage on that frame of his. You really think the body shots against Strickland were just some gentle love taps? You forget he was gassed before that round even started—because the pressure Adesanya’s been facing at middleweight has nothing to do with “liver taps” and everything to do with 45-minute wars in the heat of Las Vegas. That wasn’t Mother Time tag-teaming; that was Strickland exploiting every inch of the cage, forcing Izzy to gas on the fence while he dropped leather shots one after another. Three more years of middleweight? How? The division’s stacked, the weight-cut game’s brutal, and Izzy’s already looked mortal twice in the last twelve months. The man’s lanky enough as it is; you keep chopping his cardio down like that, and he won’t be Izzy anymore. He’ll be just another tall guy eating hooks into retirement.

body shots a retirement notice?? mate you've been watching BULLSHIT 😱 whole division been thumpin' our boy for YEARS and where's the damage eh?? Strickland got lucky for ONE ROUND then BAMnnn gaslightin' like his liver was made of glass 💀 watch the whole fight—close as a wet paper bag! that boy’s heart so big it pumps cardio AND confidence 🔥 Izzy ain’t built on body shots, he’s built on that UNSTOPPABLE SWING we all live for 🙌 nah nah nah three more years of magic before the sun sets—why cut now when the KO artist still roams the cage?? keep the chequebook safe coz we ain't seen the last firework!

Funny how Strickland’s pressure isn’t just some “gentle love taps” when we all saw him work like a machine in that cage, grinding Izzy against the fence for a full minute straight. That wasn’t “gassed from a cardio-heavy round,” mate—he was already breathing like a freight train by round three, legs jelly, every breath a struggle, and still they kept going because Strickland smelled weakness. Three more years? Tell that to his corner when he’s bent double on the stool for three straight rounds, face flushed, gasping like a beached trout. We watched him walk out of that cage looking ten years older in the space of twenty minutes, and I’ve still got the shivers from the way his ribs caved under every single body hook Strickland decided to stack up there.

remember when izzy first stepped up to middleweight? back then we were all whispering about that rock-solid chin and those ankles that didn’t quit, but nobody—nobody—could’ve predicted the carnival we’d get every time he stepped in the cage. dude turned the division into his personal showroom, stacking belts like they were discount dvds at a garage sale. you wanna talk body shots today? well look at that two-tone legacy we built—close to seven years of him picking apart killers while the world gasped. thing is, these lanky athletes always come with a shelf life for punishment. when chael came at him years ago it was the same song—raelly didn’t touch the body much back then, just a slick run to decision—but now? now every tall kid in middleweight walks in dreaming of liver shots on the fence. strickland spotted the soft spot like a hawk circling a rabbit warren, and suddenly izzy’s frame—once his secret weapon—looks like a red flag waving in the breeze. seven years at 185 is a marathon, and halfway through that stretch your old knees start telling stories you don’t want to hear. we saw it with anderson too—never the same after the body wear piled up, and he fought at light heavyweight for chrissake. three more years at middleweight against these smarter taller hunters who’ve watched every reel? the math starts to smell like burnt popcorn. izzy’s not some machine we can just rewind—he’s flesh and fire, and once the cardio clock runs out even the prettiest dance ends with you eating hooks down the stretch. so yeah, let’s enjoy the encore while the beat’s still loud, because the downhill slide once it starts ain’t pretty.

Pictures of that poor frame writhing on the stool in Vegas still make my left nut clench like a vice when I see 'em after four pints 🍻 liver hooks stacking up there round after round… I watched Strickland’s last five fights and not one bloke came out as fresh as when they walked in! When Izzy shimmied past everyone and danced on the champ, we all knew that lanky ass was gonna carry the dream—three more years of that groove? Nah, mate, his heartbeat’s still loud but his lungs are whispering otherwise.

right so zoe old mate's gone and flipped the script on us, started lining up three-year retirement clocks like it's some sort of charity raffle we're supposed to resign ourselves to. like we ain't watched izzy dance through fire before. remember that clown monteleone way back when? 2021, that's right, abu dhabi – fight cut to rounds because izzy turned the lights out in under two. no liver tap drama then, just pure stuntwork, no body attrition, no gassing against the fence. yet here we are acting like a single round against strickland exposed a hidden frailty in that frame that somehow never showed up in the middleweight wars from 2018 through 2023. seven years he's owned this division like a lease with no end date in sight, yet two rounds on the fence in vegas have us all suddenly acting like we just clocked him training with a sub-90 bpm heart. no no no – the frame ain't the problem, the approach is. izzy didn't lose to strickland 'cause his ribs are bruised, he lost 'cause he let himself get swallowed by the cage for one straight minute and ate a volume of shots that'd put most welterweights to sleep. that's on the gameplan, not the material. you give a four-inch reach advantage to these long-limbed stricklands and walk into their pressure unscripted, don't be shocked when the body shots pile up. but watch how he adapts – strickland did exactly what every other opponent's done when they've tried to box him in: they showed their hand, and izzy picked the lock after round one. yet we're ready to hand him a walking stick and call it a career? dude's still swinging like a metronome set to beautiful chaos. last i checked, that style ain't built on cardio alone – it's built on the confidence that when the gas light flickers you can stun the crowd back into focus. and that “shelf life” lark – yeah okay, remind me again who's writing those expiry dates. anderson's light heavyweight fade was rough, no doubt, but anderson was banging his head against woodleys and machachos in prime time. izzy's beaten whittaker twice, cannonier, and pulverised gasparzinho like he was demo day at the shooting range. we ain't talking about a guy running out of road, we're talking about a guy who peaks in bursts and leaves the rest of the division gasping. three more years ain't a gamble, it's a golden ticket – just don't ask him to go twelve rounds in vegas in july if the fix can be sorted elsewhere.

Mate, Strickland didn’t walk in there and whisper sweet nothings to Izzy’s body—he *marched* him straight into the fence for a full minute, volume on volume, until every single one of those lanky ribs looked like it’d been tenderised at the butcher’s. That wasn’t a rhythm shift; that was a wrecking ball swinging through the cage while Izzy’s cardio alarm blared from round three. You sit there watching his legs turn to jelly, his breath come out like a sawmill whistle, and then you tell me the frame’s fine? The frame’s absorbing every second of that punishment like a sponge left out in the rain—yeah it’s drying back up for now, but that water’s still in there, quietly reshaping the fibres. And let’s not pretend this isn’t the same tall kid who five years ago was dancing past killers without breaking a sweat. Back then the division threw everything they had at him—body hooks, thumping combinations, sprawling on top—yet the only thing that slowed him down was a well-placed shot to the dome. Now every challenger who’s got four extra inches of reach walks in with a liver-shop list in their pocket, because Izzy’s once-secret weapon has been advertised like a bloody billboard: “Kneecap Special – Courier Service to Camp Adesanya.” I’ve watched the tape again and again, frame by frame, and what I see isn’t a man on the brink—it’s a man whose style is starting to clash with the times. He’s still the guy who swaggers in, leads with that firearm right hand, and leaves the crowd howling. But last time out he also led with his ribcage against the cage, and Strickland printed like it was a trade show floor. You adapt or you get left behind; the magic isn’t gone, but the menu’s getting thinner. So no grandstanding—let’s not pretend we can see round two or round seven from here. The question isn’t whether Izzy’s done; the question is whether the next time he steps in that cage, his body remembers the standing eight count from Vegas more than his brain remembers the glory days. Seven years is a long time to stay on the treadmill without changing the shoes.