Joe Rogan confirms Israel Adesanya and Paulo Costa will coach The Ultimate Fighter

UFC color commentator Joe Rogan confirmed that UFC middleweight champion Israel Adesanya and Paulo Costa will coach the next season of The Ultimate Fighter.

Rogan made the announcement on a recent edition of his podcast “The Joe Rogan Experience.” Check out what he said below.

So according to Joe Rogan The Ultimate Fighter is set to return with Israel Adesanya and Paulo Costa as coaches. Date TBD #TUF pic.twitter.com/P8F3N1qPwr

— Nicole Bosco (@NikBos) June 26, 2020

“Oh, they’re bringing (TUF) back, by the way. Paulo Costa and Israel Adesanya,” Rogan said.

“Holy sh*t. Tell me you’re not gonna watch that.”

UFC president Dana White confirmed in an AMA on Reddit back in April that the UFC was indeed bringing back The Ultimate Fighter, the organization’s reality show about up-and-coming fighters living and training together and fighting to get a UFC contract. The show was a staple of the UFC machine from its inception in 2005 up until 2018 when the 28th and final season aired just before the UFC started its new TV deal with ESPN.

Many fans and media thought The Ultimate Fighter was done for, but White surprised everyone when he revealed in his AMA that the UFC was bringing TUF back.

“TUF is coming back SOON,” White wrote in the AMA back in April.

Although The Ultimate Fighter was an important show for the UFC for over a decade, many observers felt the last few seasons of the show were stale and that the show was not what it once was. With Dana White bringing in the Contender Series in 2017, many of the top prospects that would have competed on The Ultimate Fighter instead went to the Contender Series instead, and many felt TUF was a goner at that point.

However, with the UFC needing content for its deal with ESPN, the organization has decided to reboot TUF two years after it last aired, and it will apparently have a pair of fantastic coaches in the form of Adesanya and Costa for this next season. The two have been rumored for a few months now to be in the running to coach TUF, and now Rogan has confirmed that will indeed be the case.

Adesanya and Costa are set to showdown hopefully sometime later this year with the UFC middleweight title on the line between the two undefeated strikers. Costa was recently on social media saying that he wanted more money to fight Adesanya, so perhaps Rogan is hinting the UFC has figured out his contract and TUF will start being filmed soon.

What do you think about Israel Adesanya and Paulo Costa coaching The Ultimate Fighter?