"The funny thing was, he would run his own camps and bring his own people in, then go out there and lose and blame everybody but himself. So now if he goes to Jackson’s and doesn’t learn to open up and step out of himself then he is going to get the same results."
Evans is one of the sport’s more cerebral fighters, one who majored in psychology during his college years. He has given some thought to what might lie behind Overeem’s perceived reluctance to give up his independence.
"He just doesn’t trust people," is Evans’ assessment.
"And at the end of the day as an athlete you have to be coachable. And being coachable is a humbling thing. You have to be like, ‘let me put aside all my own thoughts and let me hear what is coming in’. Then afterwards you might weigh up what you want to take on and what you don’t.
"But when you come into a situation with a mind set on only what you want to do, only think what you what you want to think, then you’re not going to get any better.
"The thing with Alistair is he only does what he wants to do. He doesn’t want to get out of his comfort zone. He doesn’t want to do anything to get out of his comfort zone, even in training. He doesn’t want to train too hard or push himself too hard because it’s out of his comfort zone.
"But if you look at a fight, it is anything but comfortable. So when you’re fighting tough guys and you’re not willing to go out of your comfort zone, you lose.