You could cut the tension with a knife anytime middleweight champion Israel Adesanya and Paulo Costa were in the same vicinity during the leadup to Saturday's UFC 253.
Whenever the two bitter rivals have seen each other, obscenities were spewed and it felt as if an incident could occur in an instant. It came as a surprise when the two met face-to-face on the first episode of "UFC Embedded" ahead of this weekend's clash and nothing happened. One would have expected trash talk slung each way but to the shock of everyone, including Costa, that wasn't the case. The Brazilian was pleasantly surprised at how Adesanya was much different than there previous interactions.
"He changes a lot of his personality, his persona," Costa said during UFC 253 virtual media day. "The Adesanya that I saw on the video conference was (a) very disrespectful guy. He show his fingers a lot to me. When I met him upstairs, he was very kind, very gentle. When I saw him, I was ready for a different kind of guy. He came, and he gave his hand to shake his hand and asked how I'm feeling."
In their respective last contests, Adesanya and Costa took on Romero. Adesanya retained his belt, winning by unanimous decision at UFC 248, which some people felt was a relatively dull encounter. Costa (13-0) who beat Romero via unanimous decision at UFC 241, respects what Adesanya brings to the table but plans on doing what Romero failed to do and that will allow him to leave "Fight Island" with the middleweight title.
"He's a counter (striker)," Costa said. "Everybody saw when he fought Romero. If one guy don't push him, he will not push. I will try to push him, to bring him to the fight. But if he tries to avoid the fight, I will not chase him all the time. I will go back to the middle and cut the angles and try to make the fight happen."