{"id":571984,"date":"2026-03-29T11:54:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-29T11:54:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/571984\/"},"modified":"2026-03-29T11:54:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-29T11:54:08","slug":"ufc-israel-adesanya-in-no-mind-to-retire-after-defeat-to-joe-pyfer-hands-him-fourth-consecutive-loss-wwe-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/571984\/","title":{"rendered":"UFC: Israel Adesanya in no mind to retire after defeat to Joe Pyfer hands him fourth consecutive loss | WWE News"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u200b\u200b\u200b\u200b\u200bFormer two-time UFC middleweight champion Israel Adesanya brushed off retirement talk after he suffered his fourth consecutive loss.<\/p>\n

Adesanya was finished in the second round by Joe Pyfer in Seattle on Saturday night, following previous defeats to Sean Strickland, Dricus du Plessis and Nassourdine Imavov.<\/p>\n

The 36-year-old’s most recent victory came back in 2023 against Alex Pereira, when he avenged a loss from five months earlier, but he insists he is not done yet.<\/p>\n

Speaking in his post-fight interview, Adesanya said: “You keep going. Again and again and again and again and again. I’m not f****** leaving.<\/p>\n

“You’ll never stop me. I might get beat, but I’ll always remain undefeated.”<\/p>\n

Pyfer: Adesanya the best middleweight of all time<\/p>\n

Adesanya – who has now been stopped inside the distance three times in a row – started off well in defence and landed some leg kicks.<\/p>\n

But he was soon rocked by a left hook, a body shot and a right hand, with the referee then stepping in when he was thrown to the mat by Pyfer and struck from the back.<\/p>\n

\"Israel<\/p>\n

Image:
\n Adesanya (right) and Pyfer fight on the ground<\/p>\n

Pyfer said: “Izzy is not the most powerful guy in the world, we know that, but he’s one of the highest fight IQ champions of all time.<\/p>\n

“There’s nobody better. In my book, he’s the best middleweight of all time. I love you as a champion, love you as a person.”<\/p>\n

Adesanya added: “I expected the best Joe Pyfer. I knew this was his biggest fight ever. I expected his best and he brought the best.<\/p>\n

“I said coming into this fight, it’s been 13 months [since I last competed]. I wanted to feel like I’d been in a fight.<\/p>\n

“He gave me just that.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u200b\u200b\u200b\u200b\u200bFormer two-time UFC middleweight champion Israel Adesanya brushed off retirement talk after he suffered his fourth consecutive loss.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":571985,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[570],"tags":[64,63,786,785,85],"class_list":["post-571984","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mma","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-fighting","tag-mma","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/571984","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=571984"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/571984\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/571985"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=571984"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=571984"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=571984"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}