Yoel Romero barks mocking Adesanya after KO win over Manhoef

Yoel Romero was featured in a Bellator 285 main event agaist Melvin Manhoef. The age of these two main event competitors adds upto staggering 91 – but Romero still delivered.

Romero stole the show delivering a great performance. Going into the event we knew that Manhoef was done with the sport and this would be his retirement bout. While he’s not a household name right now he holds knock out victories over MMA greats Kazushi Sakuraba and Mark Hunt.

Romero is known for his explosive bursts that have stunned his opponents into incredibly timid performances. For those unaware, he comes from a background of competing in Olympic wrestling and had only made his MMA debut at 36. For the sake of comparison, Jose Aldo is retiring at 36.

The Irish crowd was fully on board with Romero and was cheering from him.

Romero would go on to lay on punishment from half guard until referee stopped the action and proclaim:

“I am the best 185lb’er in the world!”

He also barked a fair bit at the camera – which is actually a big tell he’s gunning for Adesanya.

UFC Middleweight champion Israel Adesanya is quite the showman in the octagon, from his noteworthy performances to his incredible dance moves, the Champion is not only an MMA fighter as he is also an entertainer.

One of his noteworthy celebrations happened at his UFC debut, where, after making easy work of Rob Wilkinson in the second round, Adesanya pretended to pee on stage to, in his own words, ‘mark his territory’.

In an interview to Submission Radio, the now champion explained this ‘unusual’ celebration:

“I’m the new dog in the yard, and I just pissed all over the place,” Adesanya said.

“Came in the cage, pissed everywhere. I know dogs, when they’re dominant; when a dog walks into a dog park – head high, tail high, and just kinda pees all over the place to mark his territory. And let them know, ‘that’s my spot’. That’s how dogs communicate with body language, so I just pissed all over the place.”

Since then, Adesanya frequently makes the gesture as if he’s peeing on the cage while crawling into it like a dog before an event begins. The crawling gesture isn’t noticed often and he’s since been warned to not perform the celebration in the cage again.

Adesanya had been told that the brass never wanted to see him do it again:

“‘They told my manager that, ‘We handle a lot of sponsors, millions of dollars in sponsors. So for him to pretend to be with his d**k out and shaking it after he pees as well or whatever, it’s not really a good look.’ For me, how I see it is, f**k, what are the sponsors worried about: Me pretending to whip an imaginary d**k out and pee everywhere to mark my territory or just watching me just beat the f**k out of a dude? I don’t know what kind of game these sponsors are playing or whatever, but for me, I just have to make a statement. Any top dog would do it. My stench is still there. Whenever I get back into the cage, I’m sure I’ll smell it.”