Eric
Nicksick (pictured) discussed his public altercation with Ali
Abdelaziz. | 📷: Getty/UFC
Eric Nicksick claims his brief feud with Ali Abdelaziz has been
settled.
Abdelaziz and Nicksick reportedly got into an altercation shortly
after Manel Kape’s
win over Kyoji
Horiguchi last month. Abdelaziz allegedly even threw a punch at
Nicksick before being escorted out of the venue by security.
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Eric Nicksick explains his Ali Abdelaziz incident and
apology
Nicksick recently addressed the incident without divulging too many
details. He claims that while he gets into a lot of arguments with
Abdelaziz, the latest one came to the limelight since it happened
in public.
“I told him Argentina was gonna beat Egypt. We’re brothers, man.
You get arguing with your wife, it happens in the house. This
happened more in front of people, so it became more out in public,”
Nicksick told Ariel Helwani. “But we’ve been friends for 15 years.
We argue, we fight, we bicker and we literally roll over the next
day. It wasn’t that big of a deal.”
Nicksick coaches Kape, who is managed by Abdelaziz. He claims the
manager owned up to his mistake and apologized, and the beef was
then squashed as the
Xtreme Couture head coach believes in forgiveness.
“To his credit, he said, ‘Look, dude, I’m sorry, I made a mistake.’
I’m a man; he’s a man; I think forgiveness needs to be something
that we practice a lot more,” Nicksick added. “I can understand
some of the things he’s upset about… But it really has got nothing
to do with me. But it’s all squashed. We have too much to lose,
man. We have too many guys in common… We’re all good.”
For the incident to have escalated to the point of a physical
altercation, Nicksick blames certain things involving others that
were lost in translation.
“I just think there’s some things that are lost in translation,
amongst other guys in the room that need to get squared away. And
at the end of the day, it’s my job.” As for the punch allegedly
thrown by Abdelaziz, Nicksick said, “Nothing that affected me.”
Nicksick also admits that the recent online back-and-forth between
Kape and Sean
Strickland also played a part in the feud with Abdelaziz. While
Kape and Strickland both train at Xtreme Couture, the
Ultimate Fighting Championship middleweight king has been going
off on Abdelaziz. “Starboy” has since come to his manager’s
defense, unbothered by a potential confrontation with Strickland
despite the size difference.