UFC Seattle: Adesanya vs Pyfer - Mar 28 🇺🇸

[wandshogun09]

Late getting this one up but this is tomorrow…

PARAMOUNT+ MAIN CARD
Israel Adesanya vs Joe Pyfer 

Alexa Grasso vs Maycee Barber 

Michael Chiesa vs Niko Price

Julian Erosa vs Lerryan Douglas 

Mansur Abdul-Malik vs Yousri Belgaroui 

Terrance McKinney vs Kyle Nelson 

PARAMOUNT+ PRELIMS 
Ignacio Bahamondes vs Tofiq Musayev

Chase Hooper vs Lance Gibson Jr 

Marcin Tybura vs Tyrell Fortune 

Casey O’Neill vs Gabriella Fernandes 

Navajo Stirling vs Bruno Lopes

Ricky Simon vs Adrian Yanez 

Alexia Thainara vs Bruna Brasil 

 

Not great but there are a couple of bits and bobs I kind of like. A lot of it’s gonna be a skim through job on Sunday but we’ll see how it goes. Main event should tell us a bit about just how far along Adesanya’s decline is. Not a terrible card but there’s not much really grabbing me on this one. We’re just killing time until 327 at this point, aren’t we?

 

Israel Adesanya vs Joe Pyfer headlines. I’m neither here nor there on this really. Not in love with it but it’s not a bad fight and, if nothing else, it’ll be interesting as a bit of a gauge to see what Izzy has left in the tank. There’s been a sense that he’s been on the decline for a while now and between his last few fight results and his age, it does seem to be the case. Pyfer’s a guy I think an in-form Adesanya beats all day though. So if Izzy loses this one, I think it will pretty much cement the fact that he’s on borrowed time. He’s not the type they’re gonna sack with a loss here. He’s still a name and he’s still somehow ranked #4 in the Middleweight division as I type this. But he really can’t afford another loss here. He badly needs to claw a win back to stop the rot.

I’m not a huge fan of Adesanya but he’s undeniably one of the best 185ers in UFC history. He was no Anderson Silva but he was a good champion and had a solid run for a while there. Some of the wins haven’t aged too well. The likes of Gastelum, Vettori, Costa etc haven’t done much since Izzy beat them. And who can forget the absolute stinker against Yoel Romero in 2020? But he got the two wins over Robert Whittaker, the Gastelum fight was a FOTY contender and up until Alex Pereira came in, the only blemish on Adesanya’s record was the loss to Jan Blachowicz up at Light Heavyweight. He was unbeaten at Middleweight for the first 24 fights of his career. Pereira fucked that up and then Izzy avenged it and finally got that elusive win over ‘Poatan’ in April 2023.

It was a brutal knockout and must’ve been the sweetest victory of Adesanya’s entire career when you know their backstory and history. Pereira was Adesanya’s boogeyman dating back to their Kickboxing days, then showed up in the UFC and ended his title reign. Adesanya exorcising that demon was huge for him. Looking back, it’s probably his best win. It’s also his last win though. Yeah. He hasn’t won a fight now in almost three years. And he’s gone 0-3 in his last three. Bad losses as well. Losing the belt to Strickland was a shocker at the time. And not just that, the way he lost. He looked so flat after the early knockdown and never got back into it. He somehow found himself getting another title shot in his very next fight despite that, and got submitted by DDP. Then in February last year, he got chinned by Nassourdine Imavov in Saudi Arabia. That was a surprise to me. Whether I was underestimating Imavov or overestimating what Izzy had left in the tank, I don’t know. Maybe a bit of both. But that was a fight I expected him to win. I looked at that loss as a clear sign that he’s slipping significantly. Even taking into account that I probably was selling Imavov slightly short as well, I don’t think the Adesanya of a few years ago loses to Imavov. And I look at Pyfer as a step down from Imavov so this should really give us an idea on where Adesanya is at now.

Pyfer posted this when this fight was announced. Dickhead. Not only a shitty thing to post, it’s not even original. Strickland already did pretty much the exact same thing before the Fluffy Hernandez fight in February. I’ve never warmed to Pyfer. At first it wasn’t really based on anything and I thought maybe I was being harsh. It was clear from the second he came off DWCS that he was gonna be one of Dana’s favourites so that didn’t help. But the more I see of him, the more he talks and the more he posts on social media, I feel justified for getting the early cunt vibes off him. Absolute twat. He’s the younger man here at 29 years old and has a record of 15-3 with 13 not making it to the scorecards. I don’t particularly rate him. Not because I dislike him, I just don’t think he’s got much about his game outside a hard dig and aggression. There doesn’t seem to be much intelligence to his style, or him in general really, and if he can’t just bulldoze you early he looks a bit shit. He’s managed to win his last three in a row. A vicious early KO against Marc-Andre Barriault, a decision over Gastelum and a submission over Abus Magomedov. But Gastelum is floundering these days and the other two aren’t much cop. The toughest test Pyfer’s had to date was against Jack Hermansson in early 2024 and Hermansson old manned him and kind of exposed him en route to a points win.

There you go then. Like I said, this fight is gonna give us an idea on just how far Adesanya has fallen. I really don’t think Pyfer has improved much since that Hermansson loss so, even taking Izzy’s bad form into consideration, even a faded Izzy shouldn’t be losing to a one trick ginger pony like Pyfer, in my opinion. Pyfer can whack a bit so he always has a puncher’s chance. And given that Adesanya got stopped by Imavov in his last fight and doesn’t seem to have the reaction times or defensive reflexes to get out of danger like he used to, I’m not ruling out the possibility he gets cracked again here. But Pyfer is so one-note, Adesanya really has no business or excuse to be losing to him. Unless he really is shot. If he loses this fight, I honestly wouldn’t be shocked if he calls it a day. It wasn’t that long ago he was dropping hints about maybe retiring soon and a loss here would be his fourth on the trot. Is it really worth putting the graft in at that point, when the best case scenario is you blag one last title shot only to get mauled by Khamzat? All that said, as much as I’m indifferent to Izzy, I hope he rolls back the years here and wrecks Pyfer the prick.

 

Alexa Grasso vs Maycee Barber 2 is co-main. Nothing special but it’s an alright fight. If it happens. You know the score by now with Barber. You can never be sure she’s fighting until she’s actually in there fighting. She’s had a few fights fall apart now. Most notably her scheduled Apex main event against Erin Blanchfield in May last year, which got to the point of the fighter walkouts and then Barber had a seizure or something backstage and the fight got scrapped there and then. Never seen anything quite like it. It’s pretty much impossible to pull out of a fight any later than that! Anyway, yeah, this is a rematch.

Ahh, yes, the COVID era. These two fought on the UFC 258 undercard back in February 2021. I know I saw it at the time but I remember sod all of that fight now. Grasso won on points. Might revisit it and review it in here if I can be arsed between now and…well, tomorrow. Obviously, Grasso went on to become Flyweight champion a few fights later, dethroning Valentina Shevchenko in what was a big upset for the time. It hasn’t panned out for her since though. She got bogged down in the trilogy with Shevchenko and, although the score line is officially 1-1-1 now, it definitely feels like Shev won that series overall. She absolutely dominated Grasso in their last fight. And then Grasso lost to Natalia Silva last time out. She badly needs a win here. Barber hasn’t lost since the first Grasso fight but the wins aren’t the strongest, she’s won at least one dodgy decision and of course she had the pullouts. It’s mad that she’s on a seven fight winning streak yet still has the cloud of inconsistency and unreliability hanging over her. Hopefully whatever her health issues were are sorted now and she can crack on with her career. She’s still only 27 so there’s time.

 

Michael Chiesa vs Niko Price has been confirmed as Chiesa’s retirement fight. He announced it on the Anik and Florian podcast a few months ago. He fights out of Washington so Seattle’s pretty much his hometown, and at 38, it’s a good time to bow out. He was originally supposed to fight Carlston Harris here but that fall apart and Chiesa must’ve thought his hometown farewell was up in smoke. Niko saved the day.

“Last year I knew I was up for a new contract and I talked to my manager, talked to my wife, talked to my family and said ‘Hey, I think this will be my last contract.’ At that time I was 37, I’m thinking having to juggle broadcasting and fighting. We were talking about fighting in Seattle last year and it was like ‘Man, should this be the last one? What fight is going to be bigger than me getting one more chance to fight at home?’ I threw around the idea that I was going to retire at home last year and then things didn’t work out for me to get on that card. I ended up fighting Court McGee in Atlanta. I didn’t think Seattle was going to come around again. I thought I missed the boat on that opportunity and it resurfaced.”

“I’m retiring from the sport, the sport’s not retiring me. Either way you go about it, it’s challenging. Choosing to walk away when I know I’ve still got a few fights left in me is tough. But I know there’s no fight that will be bigger for me going forward than this.” - Michael Chiesa

Makes sense. Realistically, he knows he’s never getting to the top of the Welterweight rankings or in the title race. So at that point, what are you still fighting for? Just to fight for the sake of fighting? Just for the money? He was never a contender but he had a decent little run and some solid wins when you look back. Won TUF back in 2012, beating Al Iaquinta in the finals. Submission wins over Jim Miller, Beneil Dariush and Carlos Condit. Beat Rafael Dos Anjos and Neil Magny. And he’s coming into his swansong off three wins so if he gets the W in this fight he retires on a four fight streak. There’s worse ways to go out. He should beat Niko Price as well. I like Niko but he looks about done himself. He’s 36 now, so no spring chicken either, he’s on a three fight losing skid, has gone 1-5 in his last six and was finished in four of them. He just got brutally stopped by Nikolay Veretennikov as recently as February as well, so a fairly quick turnaround and short notice here. It doesn’t sound good. Can’t see past Chiesa subbing him before doing the old lay the gloves down bit but we’ll see.

 

Julian Erosa vs Lerryan Douglas. Don’t know. Never seen or heard of Douglas but Erosa is usually entertaining to watch. He’s 36 years old and 40-odd fights into his career now though so definitely long in the tooth for a Featherweight. Like I say though, usually a decent watch. He’s coming off a decision loss against Melquizael Costa last May but it got FOTN. Before that he was on a three fight win streak, finishing Ricardo Ramos, Christian Rodriguez and Darren Elkins. Douglas is Brazilian, 30 years old with a record of 13-5 and 10 finishes. He’s fought a bunch in LFA and scored a 36 second knockout on DWCS in his last fight.

 

Mansur Abdul-Malik vs Yousri Belgaroui is one to keep an eye on. Easily one of the fights I’m most looking forward to on this card. Abdul-Malik is 28 years old and undefeated at 9-0-1 with all his wins coming inside the distance. The one blemish of a draw was due to a clash of heads against Cody Brundage. Aside from that, he’s been stopping everyone. I’m not sure about him though. The fact a shitarse like Brundage was so competitive with him doesn’t fill me with optimism. He bounced back by steamrolling Antonio Trocoli in his next fight but Trocoli’s shite. Fuck knows? Maybe there’s better to come. Belgaroui is the one I’m more interested in.

There he is next to his old Kickboxing foe Alex Pereira. They fought three times in GLORY with Pereira winning the trilogy 2-1. Belgaroui also fought Israel Adesanya twice back then, going 0-2. In MMA he’s 9-3 with seven knockouts. He made his UFC debut on the Vancouver card back in October and got the third round TKO win over Azamat Bekoev. I remember Bekoev was gaining a bit of a following going into that one and had looked good in his two UFC fights. Belgaroui just came in and messed him up though. He’s 33 so it’s not like he’s some young prospect. I’m interested to see what he can do at 185 though. At 6’5” he’s a big boy for Middleweight. Jury’s obviously out on his grappling but I liked his debut.

 

Terrance McKinney vs Kyle Nelson should be a fun main card opener. You know what you’re getting when you see McKinney’s name on a card. He’s basically the definition of the phrase ‘live by the sword, die by the sword’ when it comes to MMA. In 25 career fights, he’s still yet to go to a decision. 21 of his fights never made it out of the first round! Insane. Either he’s finishing someone or he’s getting finished. He’s not great, he’s never gonna make a ripple in the rankings, definitely never gonna challenge for UFC gold. But Christ, he goes for it. He’s coming into this one off a first round submission loss against Chris Duncan in December. Canada’s Nelson is 34 years old and 17-6-1 with 10 finishes. Decent to watch from what I remember, although nothing like the chaos McKinney brings. He’s coming off a points win over Matt Frevola on the Vancouver card in October. If he can weather the early storm here, I think it’s his fight to lose. But there’s gonna be bombs coming at him for those first few minutes at least.

 

Ignacio Bahamondes vs Tofiq Musayev might be decent. Usually enjoy watching Bahamondes, although my hopes of him being a bit of a prospect have cooled off now. He’s from Chile, 28 years old and 17-6 with 13 finishes. He’s had some nice wins over Manuel Torres and Jalin Turner and scored a beautiful spinning kick KO early in his UFC stint. But he’s came up short a couple of times now when he’s stepped up a level. He lost to Ludovit Klein back in 2023, rebounded and won a few fights, then in his last fight in June he lost to Rafael Fiziev. It was a bit of a lacklustre fight as well, which I didn’t expect. It sounded like a banger on paper but fell flat on the night. I think there’ll still be highlights from Bahamondes though. He’ll have his moments. I just think his ceiling isn’t very high at 155. I’m less familiar with Musayev. He’s from Azerbaijan, 36 years old and 22-6 with 20 finishes, 18 by knockout. Made his UFC debut in June and got subbed by Myktybek Orolbai. To be fair, that was a tough first fight in for Musayev and he’d been inactive for about 18 months prior. Interested to see how he looks here now the cobwebs are gone.

 

Chase Hooper vs Lance Gibson Jr. It’s OK. Can’t say I’m too fussed about it but I like Chase so I’d like to see him get back to winning ways here. He got slumped in a round by Alexander Hernandez last time, which ended the little streak he was putting together since moving up to Lightweight. He’d been racking up wins over the old guard of Clay Guida and Jim Miller before that loss and he was looking pretty good. Hernandez derailed him big time. He’s still only 26 but that was his fourth loss now and I think he’s one of those fighters who’s always gonna be vulnerable in the striking. Gibson Jr’s 31 years old and 9-2 with 7 not making it to the scorecards. He made his UFC debut in December and lost a split decision to King Green. Shite fight and Gibson’s performance especially was really bad as I recall. Octagon debut jitters maybe. Hopefully he redeems himself here and we get a good fight out of it.

 

Marcin Tybura vs Tyrell Fortune is happening. Because a UFC card simply can’t go by without a big fat dollop of Heavyweight shite plopped in there. This was supposed to be Tybura against Valter Walker but Walker was taken out by a foot injury of all things, which is kind of ironic considering he’s been heel hooking everything that moves lately. Anyway, Tybura’s 40 now, has a record of 20-10 and he’s coming off getting battered to a first round finish by Ante Delija on the Paris card back in September. Long time Bellator viewers will know Fortune. He also fought a bit in PFL more recently. He’s making his UFC debut, 35 years old and 17-3-0-2 with 12 inside the distance. My memory is really vague on him but he’s a wrestler and I don’t remember loving watching him when I did tune in. Never ideal making your UFC debut on short notice but he’s also facing an older Tybura coming off a rough loss and Tybura wasn’t training for a wrestler, so it might work out well for Fortune. Like any Heavyweight fight though, it also has high potential to be an absolute shitshow.

 

Casey O’Neill vs Gabriella Fernandes is doing nothing for me. At one point I thought O’Neill might be decent but that quickly fizzled out. She’s a Scottish born Aussie, 28 years old and has a record of 10-2 with 5 finishes. She came into the UFC undefeated in 2021 and stopped Antonina Shevchenko late that year. Not a great win but being undefeated and beating down Shevchenko in front of her sister, the champ, Valentina that night, it felt like there might be at least something there. No. She lost to Jennifer Maia next time out then got armbarred by Ariane Lipski. She bounced back with a decision win over Luana Santos in August 2024 and hasn’t been seen since. Brazil’s Fernandes is 32 years old and 11-3. Barely remember her and she lost her first couple of fights in the UFC. She’s gone 3-0 in her last three though. One of those wins was against Carli Judice, who’s been looking good lately. And another was a submission over Wang Cong, who had a little bit of hype at the time and Fernandes derailed it. Not saying she’s good but she’s probably not as bad as those first two UFC fights suggested.

 

Navajo Stirling vs Bruno Lopes is whatever. Standard prelim filler. New Zealand’s Stirling is undefeated at 8-0 with 4 by KO/TKO. Trains out of City Kickboxing so makes sense he’s on Adesanya’s undercard here. Scored a knockout on DWCS back in 2024 and has gone 3-0 in the UFC since. Hard to rate how good he actually is at the moment though because the wins were over Tuco Tokkos, Ivan Erslan and Rodolfo Bellato. And he went the distance with Erslan and Bellato. Think I saw those fights and nothing sticks out in the memory. Lopes I’m even hazier on. He’s 32 years old and 14-2 with 11 finishes. Beat Magomed Gadzhiyasulov in his UFC debut in January 2025, got bashed up in a round by Dustin Jacoby in the May, then hasn’t fought since. Fuck knows?

 

Ricky Simon vs Adrian Yanez jumps out to me as the potential show stealer so it’s ***WAND’S ONE TO WATCH*** this time. Sick of talking about the weird bout orders now but this being so low is a bit weird to me. Why would you relegate a fight like this to being one above the curtain jerker? Oh well. I like this one. Neither are on fire form-wise but I can’t see how these two have a bad fight. Simon is 33 now, 22-7 and dropped a decision against Raoni Barcelos in his last fight in November. He’d won a couple of fights before that and scored one of the best one punch knockouts of 2025 over Javid Basharat. But bigger picture, he’s 2-4 in his last six now. Yanez is 32 years old and 17-6 with 13 not seeing the scorecards. He was becoming a serious undercard highlight early in his UFC run, in his first five UFC fights he rattled off five wins, four by stoppage, and got either a POTN or FOTN bonus for all five of them. It’s cooled off big time in recent years and he’s coming into this fight off a bit of a lacklustre split decision loss against Daniel Marcos in December 2024 then missed all of 2025 for some reason. So yeah, neither of these two are at the best place in their careers right now. I think there’s a definite banger to be had here though. Not confident it plays out like that because we live in a time when Charles Oliveira vs Max Holloway somehow didn’t deliver. But glass half full and all that.

 

Alexia Thainara vs Bruna Brasil is just there. Brazil vs Brazil. First prelim of the night. Thainara is 28 years old with a 13-1 record, 8 by submission. She made her UFC debut on the London card last year and subbed Molly McCann in the first round. Sending the ‘Meatball’ packing. She’s ended up boxing for Matchroom. It was quite a debut for Thainara. She’d stepped in on short notice, against McCann on her home turf in the UK, danced her way to the Octagon, then made short work of her. She had a bit of momentum coming off that debut but her next fight was on the prelims on the Perth card in September, she beat Loma Lookboonmee on points and now she’s just another random Strawweight. Brasil is 32 years old and 11-6-1. She’s had a right hot and cold UFC run. She’s fought eight times in the promotion so far and has literally rotated between losses and wins the whole time. She lost a decision to Ketlen Souza last time out so, if the pattern continues, she’s due a win here.

 

 

That’ll do.

Edited March 27 by wandshogun09

[jimufctna24]

There was a dude on the Sherdog forum in the late 2010s who knew Tyrell Fortune in real life, and swore blind that he was the real deal. At the time, Fortune was unbeaten and Bellator's top heavyweight prospect, but largely unproven.

Then he got stopped by Timothy Johnson in early 2020, looked very ordinary against Said Sowma later in the year, and after a few wins lost to Linton Vassell in late 2021. He hasn't made much progress since going by his fight finder. 

In short, I wouldn't expect him much from him in the UFC. 

Edited March 27 by jimufctna24

[Carbomb]

I just looked up Vassell's record, as I know he's been around a long time, and he's just recently won a fight, at age 42! Good lord.

Checked Fortune's record, and the only two names I recognise in his win record are both shite - Meathead and Marcelo Golm.

[Dai]

Cant fathom how Cheisa is still in his 30's. He doesnt even remind me of the last generation, but actually the generation before that. Probably one of the last fighters on the roaster who has fought on the FX channel. He probably wasnt that far off fighting on the Fuel TV shows I bet.

Edited March 27 by Dai

[Egg Shen]

Feels an upside down card to me, the stronger fights seem to be on the prelims, is what it is.

I'm heavily favouring Adesanya to win. Joe Pyfer is on some kind of religious kick, going from his fight week talk I wouldn't be surprised we see a muted performance from him. I might be reading into nothing of significance, but it's led me to be confident to put Izzy on my acca.

[wandshogun09]

Izzy looked rough weighing in…

[Egg Shen]

I might have changed my pick 😆

Edited March 28 by Egg Shen

[Egg Shen]

https://www.instagram.com/reel/DWae4TQjWQR/?igsh=MXA5b2Jvdms3a3o0eA==

Dunno if you can view that, but its an MMA tipster talking about the same thing I mentioned previously about Pyfer's behaviour this week. The betting lines have swayed to make Adesanya a clear favorite now, its been leaning towards Pyfer or even until the last few days.

[wandshogun09]

Apparently Michael Chiesa vs Niko Price is now a double retirement fight…

For the best. 

[Dai]

Retirements in MMA are just as bad as ones in pro wrestling, so not sure why people make such a big deal about them for 99% of the time.

Izzy does look rough, but I bet he looks completely normal now, which is the crazy thing about these mental weight cuts.

[Egg Shen]

Yeah, I don't expect Price's retirement to stick. Doesn't he have like 9 kids? He's gonna need to fight.

That said, Price shouldn't be fighting tonight, he got flattened about 6 weeks ago.

[wandshogun09]

Sceptical myself on Niko yeah. I get the feeling Chiesa’s retirement will actually stick, he’s pushing 40, has the analyst gig and seems to understand that a main card fight in his hometown is probably as good as it’s getting for him in terms of a send-off. Niko has always seemed like one of those guys who’s gonna fight until bits of him drop off though. And if he somehow pulls off a win tonight, he’s definitely gonna backtrack on the retirement.

As far as double retirements go, these two did it right.

Ed Herman and Zak Cummings went out and had one last old man scrap back in April 2023 in Kansas City. Both laid the gloves down after and haven’t been seen anywhere near a cage or ring since. 

Edited March 28 by wandshogun09

[Egg Shen]

God blesss em

[wandshogun09]

[Bruce85]

Well this turned out to be a very enjoyable show. 
 

The finish to the Barber/Grasso fight was a thing of beauty but I did think Barber might actually be dead for a moment, very scary!