Sean O’Malley wasn’t happy about Daniel Cormier constantly bringing up his mid-fight clock glances in the commentary.
Former UFC double-champion turned color commentator Daniel Cormier is getting a lot of heat for his mic work lately. After taking shots from Dominick Cruz for supposedly not doing his homework, he’s now being chastised by rising star Sean O’Malley.
“Sugar” Sean apparently wasn’t pleased by how DC kept pointing out his clock glances in previous fights. He did it again on Saturday night during his UFC 269 main card fight against Raulian Paiva, a decision he says he’s happy with.
“I wanna thank myself for looking at the clock and seeing how much time was left,” O’Malley told reporters during his post-fight scrum. “‘Cause some people (Daniel Cormier) my last fight, he was all, ‘Oh my god, he’s looking at the clock!’ What are you talking about, dude? Yeah, I’mma look at the clock. If I didn’t look at the clock, I wouldn’t know how much time I had left.
“I land a big shot, I don’t know how much time I got left. I gotta know, ‘Should I empty my tank and try to take this dude out? Or should I wait, and then have the rest of the fight save my energy?’”
The 27-year-old then made a Lebron James comparison before questioning Cormier’s fight IQ.
“That kinda bugged me that he kept bringing that up. ‘Oh, he looked at the clock!’ The dude’s a double-champ. What’s your fight IQ? You think Lebron James is gonna f—ng drive the ball down the court and not look at the clock? Amateur.”
Cormier eventually found out about O’Malley’s comments and had this response:
He’s been very respectful so I didn’t quite get that he didn’t tell me. He’s a good dude. I don’t know what vibe I am giving these dudes that they won’t just tell me when they see me what’s going on or their thoughts. I’m open https://t.co/BwmKljRjs6
— Daniel Cormier (@dc_mma) December 12, 2021
O’Malley defeated Paiva via TKO in the first round to make a clean KO sweep for 2021. He now improves to a 15-1 record.