Sean O’Malley was not a fan of the liberties Sean Strickland took with Sneako during their early-morning sparring session last week.
Ahead of Super Bowl weekend, footage emerged online of the former middleweight world champion bloodying the controversial Rumble streamer during an intense interaction at a Las Vegas gym. In the video — which you can see right here — Strickland repeatedly blasts the influencer with strikes long after Sneako’s corner threw in the towel.
In the end, it was UFC Hall of Famer Forrest Griffin who stepped in and physically stopped Strickland from continuing the onslaught.
Sharing his take on the incident during a recent episode of his TimboSugarShow podcast with longtime coach Tim Welch, O’Malley slammed Strickland for clearly trying to hurt Sneako long after it became clear that he had given himself up.
“I thought it was f*cked up,” O’Malley said. “His corner threw in the towel. If someone came in here and wanted me to f*cking peck around with him because I’m a professional champ and they want to get a little taste of what it’s like, I’m not gonna — did you see how hard he was trying to hurt him?
“I’m a professional fighter, he’s a professional fighter — they threw in the towel, he clearly quit, he clearly was balling up and [Strickland] was still trying to hurt him. I don’t know [if it was good for Sneako].”
However, Sean O’Malley does believe there is one exception that could justify Strickland’s battering of Sneako.
“I’ve never liked hurting people,” O’Malley said. “If Sneako was talking sh*t at all then it 100 percent changes it. If someone is talking sh*t then they want to come in and want to spar and I agree then it’s different. It depends if Sneako was talking sh*t acting like he could do something then it makes it 100 percent okay to whoop his ass a little bit.”
‘Sugar’ is scheduled to make his first bantamweight title defense on Saturday, March 9 when he runs back his 2020 clash with Marlon ‘Chito’ Vera at UFC 299 in Miami. Vera is the only fighter to hold a victory over O’Malley inside the Octagon.