Sean Strickland dares Khamzat Chimaev to follow up on his street fight talk.
The former middleweight champion gets his chance to regain the title when he fights Chimaev in the main event of UFC 328 on May 9 in Newark, N.J., but both men are already champing at the bit to get their hands on each other. Chimaev said in a recent vlog that he’s not planning to hurt Strickland anymore than he has to when they meet in the octagon, but “Out on the street, that’s different—if he dies, he dies.”
Those comments made their way to Strickland, who responded on social media, telling Chimaev that since they were both training in California, they could have turned Chimaev’s hypothetical suggestion into reality.
“I generally don’t post my location or my whereabouts, I don’t really drop pins where I’m at, I just don’t like to,” Strickland said. “But I was on Instagram and some stupid shit popped up in my feed about Chimaev saying you try to fight me, you’ll kill me in the streets.
“Dude, I was, like, 10 minutes from your gym. I was dropping tags and locations all day on my Instagram. Your homies that train with you follow me, they were seeing my story. You had to know where I was at.”
Chimaev’s beef with Strickland is just the latest public spat for the UFC middleweight champion. “Borz” recently had a backstage confrontation with welterweight contender Ian Machado Garry and has a had a longstanding rivalry with one-time middleweight title challenger Paulo Costa. While those feuds remain unresolved, Chimaev has taken care of business when he steps into the cage, going 15-0 as a pro, including a lopsided decision win over Dricus du Plessis at UFC 319 to claim the 185-pound belt.
Strickland is only slightly disappointed that Chimaev didn’t follow up on his threats.
“Ten minutes from your gym, bro, I was probably right down the street with you,” Strickland said. “Part of me thought you’d show up, but as we all know with Costa, when he pulled your card, ‘Hold me back, hold me back.’ I’m like the last dude in America you should threaten, but I guess if you don’t show up, you don’t show up.”
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