UFC bantamweight champion Aljamain Sterling thinks Sean O'Malley is an unworthy challenger.
Sterling (23-3 MMA, 15-3 UFC) defends his title against O’Malley (16-1 MMA, 8-1 UFC) in the UFC 292 headliner Aug. 19 at TD Garden in Boston.
O’Malley was destined for stardom when he delivered one of the most memorable performances on Dana White’s Contender Series in 2017. He had rapper Snoop Dogg, who was commenting his fight, losing his mind and UFC president White on his feet. He has since notched five bonus-winning knockouts, but Sterling questions the caliber of his opposition.
“Dana White’s Contender Series, (O’Malley) gets a beautiful knockout, gets hyped up … has some OK fights, then he starts knocking out a couple of guys no longer in the UFC,” Sterling said on his YouTube channel. “Terrion Ware, no longer in the UFC. Andre Soukhamthath, no longer in the UFC. Raulian Paiva, I don’t think he’s in the UFC. Thomas Almeida, he’s no longer in the UFC.
“Who else did he knock out? Kris Moutinho TKO, even though they probably should have let the fight keep going. … You get this guy who’s kind of come in, has had these tailor-made fights that were handpicked for him to look like a superstar, and in all fairness, I’m not even mad at that.”
O’Malley has one-career setback, a TKO loss to Marlon Vera in August 2020. However, that didn’t halt O’Malley’s rise as he would go unbeaten in his next five fights. A razor-thin decision win over former champion Petr Yan last October is what earned him a shot at gold.
“What I’m more annoyed with is the fact that he has an opportunity to really stake his claim and declare to the division, ‘Hey, guys, this is who I am and I’m here,'” Sterling continued. “Instead, he goes out and fights ‘Chito’ (Vera), literally the fight lasts like three minutes.
“He throws a couple of kicks, he gets kicked once, he falls over, gets punched like one time, and his lights get shut out and TKO’d. He gets knocked out by ‘Chito,’ somehow moves up. He ends up fighting Pedro (Munhoz), Edward Scissorhands his eyeballs on his fingertips, and he ends up fighting Petr Yan.”
On the other hand, it took Sterling 14 UFC fights to get his shot at gold – which included wins over Jimmie Rivera, Munhoz and Cory Sandhagen. When comparing resumes, “The Funkmaster” said he had to go through the ringer to reach the top.
“You had this fight (against Yan) and it’s like, dude, we are not the same,” Sterling said. “We are just not the same. I’ve cut my teeth in this sport and in this division. What am I, 15-3 now? What are we even talking about? I got the resume. So I don’t think Sean deserved the spot.”
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