5 biggest winners from UFC 271: Israel Adesanya vs. Robert Whittaker 2

#2. Jared Cannonier – defeated Derek Brunson in a UFC middleweight bout

Jared Cannonier's win over Derek Brunson will likely net him a middleweight title shot

Last night’s middleweight clash between Jared Cannonier and Derek Brunson was effectively billed as a title eliminator. While it wasn’t a flawless showing from ‘The Killa Gorilla’, his second-round knockout win should be enough to net him a shot at Israel Adesanya later in 2022.

Early on, it looked like Brunson was the more likely to come out of the fight on top. He hurt Cannonier with some heavy shots and then came close to finishing him off with a rear-naked choke, too.

However, he also pushed himself too hard in his pursuit of the finish and seemingly gassed himself out. That was enough to allow Cannonier back into the fight.

Sure enough, ‘The Killa Gorilla’ obliged, hammered Brunson with his trademark heavy strikes and eventually put him away with some genuinely brutal elbow strikes.

Given the way the fight started, it’s going to be hard to sell Cannonier as a genuine threat to Adesanya, particularly given how Robert Whittaker comfortably defeated him in 2021.

However, when you add this win over Brunson to his previous ones over Kelvin Gastelum, Jack Hermansson and Anderson Silva, it’d also be very harsh to deny him a title shot at this point. In that sense, ‘The Killa Gorilla’ must be considered one of last night’s biggest winners.

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#1. Israel Adesanya – defeated Robert Whittaker to retain the UFC middleweight title

Israel Adesanya proved he's the best middleweight on the planet with his win over Robert Whittaker

Naturally, last night’s biggest winner was definitely Israel Adesanya, who outpointed former champion Robert Whittaker to retain his UFC middleweight title.

Sure, the victory didn’t come quite as easily as his first one over ‘The Reaper’ back in October 2019, but in a lot of ways, this win was actually more impressive. It saw him fight through at least some adversity to come out on top.

No, Whittaker didn’t hurt Adesanya at any stage or come close to finishing him. However, he made a number of the adjustments that observers expected could lead him to avenging his earlier defeat.

‘The Reaper’ tried taking Adesanya down, he was more patient and he even engaged ‘The Last Stylebender’ in more of a point-fighting bout than the first time around. But he still came up short.

Was this win as entertaining as Adesanya’s victory over Paulo Costa, for instance? Obviously not, but given that Whittaker is clearly head and shoulders above everyone else in the division, to see ‘The Last Stylebender’ edge him out again was a very big deal.

Who is next for Adesanya? Based on his own big win last night, it’s Jared Cannonier. However, based on that win, it’d be a shock to see him come close to beating the New Zealand-based striker, who remains the greatest middleweight fighter on the planet.

Based on that, there’s no doubt that ‘The Last Stylebender’ was UFC 271’s biggest winner by far.