Strickland is known for saying some pretty wild stuff in and out of the cage, and his post-fight press conference interview more than lived up to that reputation.
Sean Strickland put on a pretty impressive performance against Uriah Hall at UFC Vegas 33, out-striking and out-grappling his former teammate for a 50-44, 50-45, 49-46 decision on the judges’ scorecards. But afterward in the post-fight press conference, “Tarzan” seemed somewhat critical about his work in the cage.
“I need to learn how to hit harder,” he said. “I kind of hit like a pansy. I kind of sucked. They’re like, ‘You know you won the middleweight striking record.’ I’m like, ‘What does that mean? That means I can’t hit that hard.’”
Despite being unable to secure a finish, Strickland did beat Hall up pretty bad, closing his opponent’s eye.
“I think I might have broken his orbital,” Strickland said. “Just cuz in the second round he was blinking and rubbing his eye like someone who broke his orbital. I was like ‘Oh yeah, I probably broke his orbital.’ It was honestly a testament to see someone who was probably fighting with one eye finish a fight like that.”
It was a rather measured and methodical performance from a fighter that’s known for regularly providing oddball soundbites. Like, for example, using his victory speech to declare “If it wasn’t for the UFC I’d probably be cooking meth in a trailer or in prison.”
“I’ve actually never done a drug in my life,” Strickland clarified during the post-fight presser. “I just think if I did drugs I would probably lose my mind so I stay away from it. I think after I’m done fighting I’ll go on a shroom journey. Everyone swears by shrooms. My pad man is always trying to take me on a shroom journey, so maybe after I’m done fighting. I don’t think I’ll go meth. Maybe acid or something.”
“I’ve never done drugs. But here’s the thing: if you don’t have a lot of issues, go do drugs, have fun, enjoy your life. But if you’re a guy who has an addictive personality, you watch too much porn, whatever you gotta do, stay away from drugs, it’s going to f—k your life up.”
It didn’t take much to get Strickland to then expound on the porn addiction part of that statement.
“Here’s the thing, guys. I’m gonna give you some advice. You guys gotta jerk off. Like, I don’t know if you’re having sex on the regular, but you gotta jerk off once or twice a day, man. If you don’t use it, you lose it. So to me, my porn addiction and jerking off, it’s nothing I want. I’m just trying to stay f—king angry and stay sharp, you know? I’m also left-handed, so that’s why my jab’s so good.”
That wasn’t even the wildest part of the press conference. Strickland ended things off by casually declaring he was hoping for a kill in the cage one day.
“If you like to f—king hurt people, you’re in the right sport, man” Strickland said with a big smile. “I would love nothing more than to kill somebody in the ring. Nothing more. It would make me super happy. I would own that s—t, too. I don’t know if it would make me liable, I might have to say I’m sorry if the cops came, but I would own that s—t. Own it. Be a psychopath, it’s f—king fun!”