Sean Strickland wants to defend his UFC middleweight title against whoever will make him the most money.
On September 9, Strickland shocked the world by dethroning Israel Adesanya with a unanimous decision win at UFC 293. Since then, the MMA community has debated who the new middleweight king’s first title defense should be against.
Strickland’s next opponent will likely be an immediate rematch against Adesanya or a new challenge against Dricus Du Plessis. During a video posted to his YouTube channel, the 32-year-old world champion had this to say about who he wants to fight:
“I thought Izzy would be better. I’m sure the UFC might give him a rematch, and, you know, he might take it a little bit more serious and put up a better fight…My thing is, when it comes down to my next fight, everybody is like, ‘Who do you want to fight?’ I don’t give a f*ck. I want to make f*cking money. I get those PPV buys, give me somebody who’s gonna make me f*cking money.”
In December 2022, Sean Strickland suffered a controversial split-decision loss against Jared Cannonier. Luckily for Strickland, he bounced back and secured wins against Nassourdine Imavov and Abus Magomedov before taking out Israel Adesanya.
Chris Curtis believes the UFC could struggle selling Sean Strickland vs. Israel Adesanya 2
There’s an argument that Israel Adesanya deserves an immediate rematch. With that said, Sean Strickland undoubtedly defeated him by unanimous decision, and ‘The Last Stylebender’ wasn’t coming off a long title reign.
During the same video posted on Strickland’s YouTube channel, Chris Curtis had this to say about the middleweight king potentially fighting Adesanya again:
“It’s really hard to sell that rematch [between Sean Strickland and Israel Adedanya]. You’re [Adesanya] coming off a rematch. So, you lost one, you won one, then you lost one again. Then you can beat arguably possibly 5-0 or 4-1 [against Strickland]. How do you sell that?”
Before fighting Sean Strickland, Israel Adesanya endured a split two-fight series against Alex Pereira, which ‘The Last Stylebender’ ended with a highlight-reel knockout win.
It’s unclear what’s next for the former UFC middleweight champion, but there’s a chance he gets an opportunity to claim revenge against Strickland.
Watch the entire clip of Sean Strickland and Chris Curtis talking about what’s next below:
