Sean
O’Malley believes that Aljamain
Sterling might do well at featherweight but is unsure whether
we will get to find out.
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In an appearance on The MMA Hour, O’Malley
expressed his doubts over whether Sterling, whose
Ultimate Fighting Championship bantamweight title he took via
second-round knockout at UFC 292 in August, has enough confidence
to move up to featherweight. While “Funkmaster” initially lobbied
for an immediate rematch, he has since changed course towards a
possible move up to 145 pounds. Sterling recently revealed that he has been
offered a booking against perennial featherweight contender
Calvin
Kattar but is keener on a clash against former champ Max
Holloway.
O’Malley believes going up makes sense for Sterling given the
latter’s natural size. While “Sugar” believes Sterling also the
required skillset for featherweight, he believes the former champ
might prefer sticking around at bantamweight for the size
advantage. O’Malley said on The MMA Hour:
“I think if he goes up to 145, it’d be super interesting. I think
there’s a lot of interesting fights up there at ‘45, I think his
weight gets big enough for that. You know, I’m probably 160 right
now, I probably not getting over this. He’s probably 175. Like, it
just doesn’t make sense to go back to 135, for his health, for his
longevity […] He’ll probably go back down to 135, just because he’s
insecure and he wants to be stronger and bigger than these guys.
Why else would he not fight at 145? It’s not like his skills aren’t
there. His skills, he’s good. Not as good as me, but he’s good. You
know what I mean? He could go up to 145, I think he’d do fine up
there.”
Meanwhile, O’Malley is slated to make his first title defence at
UFC 299 in March in a grudge rematch against Marlon Vera,
who handed the champ his lone professional loss in 2020.