Israel Adesanya didn’t quite have the triumphant return to the octagon he was hoping for. After the biggest upset loss against Sean Strickland last year, ‘The Last Stylebender’ fell short and submitted to the reigning champ Dricus Du Plessis, despite glimpses of his retro self, looking sharp and as much a sniper as ever. And being the warrior that he is, ‘Izzy’ didn’t make any excuses for the fight and gave Du Plessis his credit for beating him fair and square despite the animosity they had for each other coming in.

However, this was short-lived as the former champ seemingly agreed with arch-rival Alex Pereira, who asserted that ‘Izzy’ was probably injured during the fight, which affected his performance. And along with a possible injury, Joe Rogan thinks there is another reason that led to the Kiwi-Nigerian’s loss- fatigue.

The UFC commentator, on episode #162 of the JRE MMA Show with welterweight champ Belal Muhammad was talking about how incredibly crucial a fighter’s gas tank is at the highest level. During this discussion, he gave the example of ‘Izzy’s UFC 305 performance. “When a fighter gets tired like when Izzy got tired in that fourth round with Dricus, you could see he’s he’s not the same Izzy as in the first round that’s like lightning fast and moving and countering and controlling distance and getting out of range. This is a Izzy that’s experiencing fatigue,” he said.

He pointed out how Adesanya seemed to be more and more sluggish and not quite as sharp in the latter rounds, and felt that while the Yoruba may have gotten injured during the fight, it was ultimately his gas tank that slowed him down and led to the submission. “[Reading from an article] Eagle eyed Alex Pereira spots Israel Adesanya injury, draws partial confession from ‘Stylebender’… Well they clash shins a bunch of times. I mean it could have happened in the fight but the problem is he was still tired. I mean I’m sure he was injured,” Rogan added.

But what exactly did Pereira say that started the whole ‘injury’ conversation?

Alex Pereira finds Israel Adesanya’s lack of inside leg kicks on UFC 305 suspicious

While Alex Pereira admitted in a recent interview that he didn’t actually know if Adesanya was injured in the Du Plessis fight, he suspected as much. Why? Well because he thought ‘Izzy threw too few of his famous inside leg kicks, one of his best weapons, during the fight with the South African.

Maybe Adesanya had an injury. You could see he kicked very little. That inside kick of Adesanya’s is very good… It was a good weapon and he didn’t continue doing that inside kick. Even Dricus said it bothered him; it also bothered me. He didn’t continue to do it,” Pereira said.

Of course, this was pure speculation on ‘Poatan’s part, but it did seem to be partially confirmed by ‘Izzy’ tweeting (in part) “this guy knows me” when addressing the Brazilian’s comments. The Yoruba didn’t go as far as to outright say whether or not he was injured, probably because he would be excoriated by fans for making excuses, but the implications of his response were clear for everyone to see, including Joe Rogan.

What do you think about Rogan’s take on ‘Izzy’s loss? Do you agree? Why or why not? State your thoughts in the comments below!