Sean O’Malley literally had a front row seat to one of the craziest press conference in history when Josh Hokit nearly started a brawl with Alex Pereira and Ilia Topuria ahead of the UFC White House card on June 14.
Well known for his outlandish promos and bizarre behavior, Hokit took aim at Pereira, who is fighting for the interim heavyweight title on the card but also speaks very limited English so he clearly didn’t understand the insults being lobbed his way. That’s what led to Topuria intervening before eventually throwing something at Hokit, which prompted UFC security to pull the always outspoken heavyweight off the stage before the situation turned volatile.
Through it all, O’Malley just sat there stoically between the three fighters jawing at each other, but Hokit was admittedly disappointed the former UFC bantamweight champion didn’t have his back in that moment.
“Imagine having the opportunity of a lifetime, set up by me perfectly to back your fellow American and call your shot but the moment passes you by because you are simply ‘too cool,’” Hokit wrote on Twitter. “We’ll all be on our death bed one day… hopefully he doesn’t regret that.”
O’Malley swore off social media a couple of years ago so he never saw that message but looking back at the situation, he admits he probably should have been more vocal and backed up Hokit during that tense moment.
“Dammit, I’m not on social so I don’t see anything,” O’Malley told MMA Fighting. “I know that whole moment went viral and I didn’t see Hokit saying that. Yeah, maybe I should have. When you’re that close to Alex Pereira, you don’t really think like ‘I might talk some shit.’ I’m like I’m going to sit here and f*cking shut up.
“But you know what, he’s not wrong. I should have been on Team Hokit. He’s absolutely right. Maybe I should have stepped back a few feet and got behind him and then started talking shit.”
At the time, O’Malley says he was just trying to stay cool, calm and collected because truth be told, he didn’t have beef with anybody involved in that altercation. Just sitting there staring forward while Hokit shouted insults and Topuria tried to get past security to take a swing at him was a pretty hilarious image.
Still, O’Malley missed a golden opportunity to inject himself into the situation and maybe that moment could have eventually led to him facing off with somebody like Topuria, who he’s called out in the past after teasing a potential move up to featherweight.
“I f*cked up,” O’Malley said. “I think what went through my mind, if I don’t do anything and I just sit here still, it would look hilarious. That was kind of my thought process and it worked out that way.
“But Hokit was right. I could have spoke up and said something. Nothing comes to mind, but I could have spoke up.”
In that moment, O’Malley admits that the last thing he wanted to do during that whole viral encounter was make the wrong move and somehow end up on Pereira’s bad side.
Pereira may be making his heavyweight debut when he faces Ciryl Gane on the UFC White House card, but he has a lifetime highlight reel filled with opponents he executed in vicious fashion and the same goes for Topuria.
In other words, O’Malley didn’t want to become collateral damage if a melee erupted.
“Two of the greatest knockout artists in the world of all-time, legends sitting within five feet of me, both of them,” O’Malley said about Pereira and Topuria. “I wasn’t feeling too gangster right there to say the least.”
O’Malley might get another chance to make things right because there’s another UFC White House press conference scheduled for June 12 in Washington D.C. Of course, UFC CEO Dana White has already said that after what happened at the previous press conference, he’s going to rethink the seating arrangement to ensure none of Hokit’s antics spill over into an actual brawl just days away from one of the biggest events in the company’s history.
For his part, O’Malley says he’s going to keep his attention on his fight against Aiemann Zahabi and anything left over is going to be used to avoid ending up on Pereira’s bad side.
“Absolutely, I’ll focus my energy on Aiemann,” O’Malley said. “Maybe a little Topuria. Pereira, I want nothing to f*cking do with that guy.”
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