Adesanya was busted for drunk driving just 18 days before losing title bout

The news doesn't get better for recently dethroned ex-champion Israel Adesanya and I have to hand it to UFC for keeping this story under wraps until after the fight actually took place between Izzy and Sean Strickland. As it turns out Israel was charged with "drink driving" in his home country of New Zealand less than a month before his title fight at UFC 293.

src

It is unclear whether or not he was arrested when he was pulled over but I would imagine that protocol would make it impossible for him to simply be allowed to drive away from the scene. He pleaded guilty to the charges and I wonder how much special treatment he was given by the authorities because of his fame. The maximum fine for drink driving in New Zealand is $4500, which is an absurd fine for the common man but merely pocket change for Izzy.

This kind of tarnishes his name a bit more though, because Dana White is kind of obligated to denounce this sort of thing. Remember when Jon Jones was constantly in trouble with drinking and drugs? Well as much as it pained Dana White and the rest of UFC's wallets, they were basically obligated to sideline him for these events. Of course Jon Jones' violations were much worse than Israel's by a long shot. If I'm not mistaken someone was seriously injured or maybe even died because of Jones' drunk driving. I'll have to look that up.

This kind of is another indicator that Adesanya wasn't really taking the fight against Sean Strickland seriously because if he was he wouldn't be out drinking a little over 2 weeks before a major fight. If you saw the fight against Sean you know what I am talking about because Izzy just didn't seem to be himself. He didn't look like the sort of dominating presence that was considered to be one of the best pound-for-pound fighters of all time. He didn't even look like a champion. Strickland was even surprised about the victory because even he didn't expect to walk away with gold, he just expected to walk away with a really nice paycheck.

On another note I have to say that I think the drink-driving rules in New Zealand a bit absurd. The legal limit is .05 whereas in USA, which is also absurd, it is .08. I think that if someone merely had 2 drinks that it would put them over the limit and at that point it almost seems like police are intentionally targeting people who leave places that serve alcohol and following them and making up some reason to pull them over and subsequently subject them to a breathalyzer. Someone like Adesanya needn't worry about this because he can afford it, but the average Joe doesn't just have $4500 lying around.

Also, I always find it extremely stupid when very wealthy people even bother to drive themselves from bars regardless of how much they have had to drink. You are super rich! Why are you even driving yourself at all?