UFC: Henry Cejudo wants Kamaru Usman vs Israel Adesanya – ‘This is about legacy’
- Former two-division title-holder encourages welterweight champ to move up to middleweight for fellow Nigerian
- ‘The Nigerian Nightmare’ has previously rejected the idea, saying ‘it’s not really something that interests me’
Henry Cejudo, the former UFC flyweight and bantamweight champion, believes Kamaru Usman must put personal feelings aside and seek out a fight with his fellow Nigerian Israel Adesanya.
Usman, the UFC welterweight champion, is arguably the most dominant fighter in MMA at present, and the promotion‘s No 1-ranked pound-for-pound fighter.
After Usman’s latest victory, a hard-fought decision win over Colby Covington at UFC 268 last Saturday in New York, Cejudo believes the 34-year-old welterweight champ must challenge middleweight king Israel Adesanya to cement his place among the sport’s greatest fighters.
“It‘s all about legacy,” the former two-division champion told The Schmo. “Somebody else in the near future is going to be able to go through the same run that Kamaru Usman did. But the difference is that can you win a second belt? And can you defend that second belt? And that’s what I want from ‘The Nigerian Nightmare.’ I want him to go up. I want him to fight ‘Izzy.’ I just believe he has a perfect style to beat somebody like ‘Izzy’ because he has wrestling.
“You’ve already lapped the [welterweight] division, Kamaru Usman,” Cejudo said, addressing Usman directly. “You’ve already beat Colby [Covington] twice. You’ve already beat [Jorge] Masvidal a couple times too. I mean, the winner of Masvidal and [Leon] Edwards – you’re gonna beat Edwards again.”
Usman, who now lives in South Florida, has previously rejected the idea of a champion vs champion fight with Adesanya, arguing that it’s better for Nigeria to have two champions with belts than one champion with two belts.