Israel Adesanya earns a place in UFC veteran’s top 5 greatest of all time list after ‘brave’ UFC 287 victory

Last weekend at UFC 287, Israel Adesanya produced the performance of a lifetime. He was able to defeat heated rival Alex Pereira, avenging his November 2022 defeat and reclaiming the UFC middleweight title.

After his win over Alex Pereira, many observers have been quick to label Israel Adesanya as one of the UFC’s all-time greats. Some have even suggested the win puts him ahead of the great Anderson Silva in the middleweight division’s overall pantheon.

One fighter who has elevated ‘The Last Stylebender’ considerably in his own pantheon of UFC greats is welterweight veteran Matt Brown.

In a recent interview with MMA Fighting, ‘The Immortal’ was happy to proclaim Israel Adesanya as one of his top five all-time UFC greats after his victory over ‘Poatan’.

Stating that Adesanya’s approach took “courage and bravery,” Brown claimed that he would have a hard time saying no to putting him in the top five of all time:

“I felt like this fight he just threw that out the window and said ‘I’m not wrestling you, we’re doing a kickboxing match and I’m f****** you up. I commend him for that. That took balls for him to do that. That took courage. That took bravery. That took all the things that qualify a champion like Adesanya and I think you’ve got to start putting him in the top five GOAT list now.”

Fascinatingly, one fighter who Brown claimed Adesanya has surpassed is Georges St-Pierre, who is considered the consensus GOAT of Brown’s own weight division, welterweight:

“If we want to compare with other GOATs that we always talk about, GSP had a very unexciting career as a champion. We simply put him up there for his wins, his amount of wins and not losing rounds. This fight just hit me a different way. Maybe I’m a little bit biased right now because it just happened this weekend and still a little bit high from it. It definitely gave me a buzz watching that and Adesanya just the way he did it, I think that’s an extremely special person to be able to do that.”

Whether ‘The Last Stylebender’ has surpassed the likes of St-Pierre and Silva, of course, depends on an observer’s perspective. However, it’s clear that Israel Adesanya did his claims to greatness no harm with his win last weekend.

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Does Israel Adesanya have more title defenses than Georges St-Pierre?

Despite Matt Brown’s claims that Israel Adesanya should be considered above Georges St-Pierre in the UFC’s pantheon of all-time greats, ‘The Last Stylebender’ does not match ‘Rush’ when it comes to victories in the octagon.

Adesanya initially won the UFC middleweight title from Robert Whittaker in 2019. He then went on to defend it successfully on five occasions, defeating Yoel Romero, Paulo Costa, Marvin Vettori, Whittaker (in a rematch) and Jared Cannonier.

With his win over Alex Pereira, who took the title from him last November, Adesanya will now begin his second reign as champion.

St-Pierre, meanwhile, first claimed UFC welterweight gold in 2006 by beating Matt Hughes. He lost the title in his first defense against Matt Serra, but like Adesanya, later avenged his loss to reclaim it in 2008.

‘Rush’ then held the title for five more years, defending it successfully against nine opponents. Only Anderson Silva and Demetrious Johnson were able to defend their titles successfully on more consecutive occasions.