‘Suga’ Sean O’Malley handed Aljamain Sterling his first defeat in five years at UFC 292 as the bantamweight championship changed hands.
In the immediate post-fight interview he didn’t commit fully to wanting a rematch against O’Malley or whether he wanted to move up to featherweight as he had talked about previously. He expressed concern about moving up to face the joint number one pound-for-pound king Alexander Volkanovski as ‘Suga’ Sean caught him with relative ease in the second round.
Ray Longo Reveals Aljamain Sterling Gets O’Malley Rematch
During Jon Anik’s and Kenny Florian’s UFC 292 recap podcast on the DraftKings YouTube channel, guest Ray Longo, Aljamain Sterling’s head coach, revealed details regarding a potential immediate rematch with Sean O’Malley.
“Sean Shelby [UFC matchmaker] said do you want a rematch, Aljo said 100%, I 100% want a rematch. So there was talk, Sean asked, and he said it, so I’m saying he’s getting a rematch.
I mean they said the numbers were outstanding for the biggest bantamweight Pay-Per-View. Is that true? Somebody told me so. You know, they’re gonna be dictated by money. Doesn’t matter now who it is, if they made a bank on that thing they’ll do it again for sure, so Sean did say that, Aljo said 100% no questions about it and I think that’s where we are.
And I think he will make the adjustments. I think he’s got a good idea, he knows exactly what happened, that’s the good news. He knows he over-extended himself, you know, whatever. But again [it was a] beautiful counterpunch.
He flew to Los Angeles today to see the doctor so we’ll have a better idea of his timeline when he gets back”
In the same section of the podcast, they discussed the “hatred” that Aljamain Sterling receives and Ray Longo was in disbelief during the fight as the crowd chanted “f*** you Aljo” with Longo expressing it was getting “personal” but that it’s “part of the game.”
Do you think Aljamain Sterling deserves an immediate rematch? Let us know in the comments!
Featured image credits to Embed from Getty Images
