Eugene Bareman is not putting much stock in Robert Whittaker’s comments heading into UFC 271.
UFC middleweight champion Israel Adesanya faces Whittaker for the second time when he defends his title in Saturday’s headliner at Toyota Center in Houston. In their first encounter, Adesanya knocked out Whittaker in the second round to become undisputed champion and keep his undefeated record intact. Since then, Adesanya has tasted defeat, losing a unanimous decision to Jan Blachowicz at UFC 259 in a failed attempt to win a second UFC belt. In the build up to the fight, Whittaker suggested that Blachowicz showed “the blueprint” on how to beat Adesanya, one which he intends to use.
But, Bareman doesn’t believe it.
“I actually think that’s a bit of a red herring from their team,” Bareman said this week on The MMA Hour. They won’t do that, I don’t believe. I think they understand the athlete that they have in front of them. They are able to understand Robert’s characteristics, but they don’t match Jan’s. It is not a good idea to try to transpose one fighter’s blueprint to another.
“I have a lot of respect for their team, they’re a very smart team, and I don’t expect them to do that.
“The Blachowicz Blueprint” is not the only storyline coming into UFC 271 though. Whittaker has said that he’s in a much better place mentally this time around than he was heading into their first fight, and fans have pointed to his subsequent string of victories as proof not only of this, but that Whittaker’s skills have gotten better in the past two years.
For his part, Adesanya doesn’t buy into this narrative, and neither does Bareman.
” I think that’s an agenda being promoted,” he stated. “I think there is improvement, but maybe not the degree that the media is pushing, and I think that’s what Israel is alluding to. Although we see improvements, we have three more fights. These three fights highlighted some weaknesses that we were aware of, but they also revealed some new vulnerabilities we didn’t know about in our previous work. We see improvements but also see some weaknesses. It’s both .”
Bareman is skeptical about the stories surrounding Saturday’s rematch. However, his doubts don’t reflect the expectations he has for Whittaker on Saturday night. Both Bareman and Adesanya realized that Whittaker didn’t perform well in his first fight. They expect him to show his best this time.
” The truth is that we were able to remove Robert from the situation before he reached his potential,” Bareman stated. “I think everyone on the team, including Israel, believe he has more to show than that and that’s what’s kinda motivating him. Robert is a much better fighter than he was that Melbourne night, so rematches can be difficult. Israel has been in several rematches and knows the importance of training twice as hard, and that no stone is left unturned. Robert knows this and has made it a point to train twice as hard, leaving no stone unturned.
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