- Ben Askren blames Jamahal Hill’s overconfidence in his UFC 300 knockout loss to Alex Pereira
- “Funky” thinks “Sweet Dreams” didn’t respect “Poatan’s” striking and knockout power
Ben Askren is convinced Jamahal Hill relied heavily on his confidence against Alex Pereira and suffered the consequence at UFC 300.
This angle of Alex Pereiras KO over Jamahal Hill. 😍#MMA #UFC #UFC300 pic.twitter.com/Nz9fQZSUU3
— MMA Frenzy (@mma_frenzy) April 15, 2024
Jamahal let his ego win
Speaking on Daniel Cormier’s YouTube channel, “Funky” weighed in on Hill’s mindset heading into his light heavyweight title fight with Pereira. For Askren, it’s easy to see that “Sweet Dreams” was too confident about being able to take on “Poatan” in a standup fight, completely disregarding the fact that the Brazilian was a high-level striker with some devastating power in his hands. In the process, Hill got knocked out.
“I guess my general feeling on that fight was that I thought Jamahal Hill was a little too confident, saying he could stand with him… I feel like he was too confident I feel like he disregarded how hard Pereira hits,” Askren assessed.
“Honestly… my feeling? Ego. Ego gets involved with these fighters and he thought, ‘Everyone is saying, hey Jamahal, Pereira is the better standup fighter, he’s gonna put you down.’ And he said, ‘No! No, it’s not gonna happen!’ We talked about when he caught the arrow and broke it… It’s fun… that’s ego speaking. I did think that maybe put him in harm’s way,” he added.
Alex was eager to knock Jamahal out
Askren could be fight about his take on Hill, considering all the taunting he did on Pereira leading up to the fight. After his win, “Poatan” even admitted that he was prepared to go five rounds with “Sweet Dreams” but he decided to go for the KO because of Hill’s disrespectful antics.
As it stands, Pereira is moving on and eager to compete at UFC 301 in Brazil and move up to the heavyweight division. He is currently being linked to showdown with Tom Aspinall but the UFC has yet to decide on the idea.
