UFC fighter Rob Whittaker has had plenty of time to re-evaluate his career. Now the time to fight his way back to the top has arrived, writes ADAM PEACOCK.
In the big, bad world of prize fighting, Rob Whittaker is a bit of an outlier.
Be it in an octagon, or ring, many of the best to throw a punch, kick or chokehold love to pre-empt action with words.
Conor McGregor, the most famous of the lot of them, would waltz in arms and lips swinging, cursing the wind, promising the world. For a while there, he delivered.
Floyd Mayweather never shuts up. Never got beaten either, the prophet of profit.
Motormouths can be great. Or they can headbutt the canvas, lights out, their fuse box blown up by a knuckle sandwich.
It’s all part of the game. There is time for talking. Then fighting.
Whittaker, the outlier, can only be bothered with the laughter.
Sure, he’s confident. He’s adamant he’ll win his next fight on the long road back to the top of his craft, the UFC Middleweight division.
His opponent, brash Italian Marvin Vettori, doesn’t mind running his mouth.
“I have no beef with Whittaker. I just wanna destroy his face. Smash him,” Vettori said last week, jaw clenching for a little flex after his decisive proclamation.
Those words don’t make Whittaker angry, or delve into a well-hidden bag of insults.
They make him laugh.
“I expect him to say that! What’s he gonna say, I’m not gonna hit him!” Whittaker laughs at CODE Sports.
“Because I’ve always been outside it, never got involved in that kind of stuff, it’s hard for people to get a bite from me.
“If he wants to do that, he can.”
Whittaker’s fight against Vettori is part of the UFC’s first big show in Paris.
The city of love. Long walks along the Seine, hand-in-hand, hearts full, beautifully interspersed with MMA fighters trying to punch, kick and arm bar seven shades of sh-t out of each other. So romantic.
Whittaker has taken his wife, his rock, Sofia to Paris with him, along with their youngest of four children, 18-month-old Jace, meaning it’s not really a relaxing holiday on two fronts.
Still, Whittaker promises there’ll be a nice dinner and time to see the sights after next Saturday’s fight.
Before then, there’s nearly a week of channeling his inner beast. The week will move slowly. Minutes feel like hours, hours feel like days.
Whittaker is fighting for the first time since his February loss to Israel Adesanya, the gold-standard Middleweight ever since the Kiwi came to Melbourne in 2019, knocked Whittaker’s block off, and took his world title belt.
After that fight, Whittaker delved into the unknown of uncertainty. He lost desire. Stepped back and had to recalibrate.
He got himself back on track, winning three fights to set up a rematch with Adesanya for the Middleweight crown in February.
The result was the same as the first fight, but it went the distance and went to a tight decision, which Adesanya edged on all scorecards. Many, including Whittaker, thought he did enough for an upset. Adesanya, about as likely to hide an opinion as a TikTok star hides vanity, laughed off that summation.
Whittaker walked on, and this time, there were no post-Adesanya blues.
“Night and day,” Whittaker says about the difference in mindset between the two title fights
“Having that reflection (after the first fight) made a big impact. Had to re-evaluate why I fight, what I wanna do, where I wanna go.”
“Understanding that made me take a new perspective to the training and what I wanted out of it. Always trying to change training up, so it’s never to the point of, you can’t wait until this is over.
“And that process led me here. Just a happy chappy.”
He’s ready to rumble with Vettori in Paris.
The winner, so the millions of fight experts guess, will get a shot at the winner of November’s Middleweight title fight between Adesanya and Brazilian Alex Pereira.
Could it be Adesanya-Whittaker 3?
“Honestly, I haven’t thought about it. The goal is simply to beat Marvin,” Whittaker says.
“You deal with the fallout afterwards. My calendar and my thought process doesn’t extend past beating Marvin.”
Whittaker knows exactly what is coming with Vettori, who likes to pressure his opponent and has only lost twice in his past 10 UFC fights, both to Adesanya.
“(Vettori) is a tenacious hard fighter,” the Australian says.
“Got a lot of grit. Likes turning fights into a dogfight. Top of the food chain for a reason. I’ll do everything in my power not to let him get his game plan off.
“He wants to be in my face. My strategy is crystal clear. Had months to work on it, thinking about it.”
“Gonna try to hit him as hard as I can, and as fast as I can.”
When it’s put to Whittaker that hitting the face in front of him is a rather simple agenda born out of months of planning and sweat in his gym in south-west Sydney, he brings up a rather good point.
“The best plans are simple.”
A focused mind with a clear objective of winning the next fight is what got Whittaker back on track after his period of reflection.
Those days are long, long gone.
“It’s a different vibe when I’m doing my work, enjoying the process, enjoying the journey, the training.
“Couldn’t be happier and now it’s time to earn some bread,” he smiles, with conviction.
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