Following his technical knockout victory over Aljamain Sterling in the second round at UFC 292, Sean O’Malley was presented with the UFC Performance of the Year award for the year 2023 today.
In the process of breaking Sterling’s nine-fight unbeaten record and becoming the new bantamweight champion, “Sugar” ultimately accomplished the goal that he had been working toward for his entire life.
However, the current award that O’Malley received has left fans perplexed. These fans have taken issue with Dana White, the CEO of the UFC, for not awarding the Most Outstanding Fighter award to Sean Strickland for his shocking upset victory over Israel Adesanya at UFC 293.
A unanimous decision victory for Strickland has been recognized as one of the most shocking outcomes in the history of UFC title fights. Strickland was able to dominate the former two-time champion throughout all five rounds of the fight, which led to his victory.
However, White stated that ‘Tarzan’ did not do enough to convince him, and he made this statement in a video that was recently uploaded to the UFC Instagram page:
“A lot of excellent fights and a lot of great performances were seen throughout the event. Nevertheless, I couldn’t help but choose ‘Sugar’ Sean O’Malley… ‘Sugar’ Sean, who goes in there with Aljamain Sterling, was met with a great deal of skepticism from a great number of individuals. to enter and complete [Sterling] in the manner in which he did. It was necessary for me to hand it over to him.
To view the video, click here:
Members of the audience expressed their opinions in the comments section, and they said the following:
“Sean O’Malley is just pure glazing””Sean Strickland deserves performance of the year!””C’Mon Dana DeSean was the only right answer here” A. O’Malley?
Sean O’Malley shares his prediction for Sean Strickland vs. Dricus du Plessis at UFC 297
Next weekend, the main event of UFC 297 will feature a fight between Sean Strickland and Dricus du Plessis.
‘Tarzan’ is currently a -125 favorite on the betting lines for the fight that will take place between the two fighters for the middleweight championship. However, Du Plessis has demonstrated time and again that he is capable of exceeding expectations, despite the fact that he has been the underdog in many of his promotional appearances.
After a spectacular upset victory over Robert Whittaker, whom he defeated via technical knockout at UFC 290, the South African fighter will enter his fight with Strickland full of confidence. Whittaker was defeated by the South African fighter.
On the other hand, the champion will be similarly confident in himself prior to the fight night by virtue of the fact that he recently won the title by defeating Israel Adesanya at UFC 293.
Recently, Sean O’Malley expressed his opinions regarding the main event that took place at UFC 297, and he stated:
If Sean Strickland is able to perform as well as he did against Adesanya, I believe that he will be able to defeat Du Plessis… A fight against Strickland over five rounds, each lasting five minutes, is a nightmare…I simply have a feeling that Strickland is capable of completing the task at hand.
