Welcome to the Suga Show

 


By Stuart Graeber, Swish Tribune


On August 19th, 2023, the UFC broke gate records at the TD Garden as well as multiple UFC selling records. UFC 292 broke the record for most PPV buys for a Bantamweight fight ever and the marketing was spearheaded by the most popular fighter in the UFC, Sean O'Malley. Suga Sean has been dominant on his rise to the top in the UFC with his only loss coming via injury when Marlon "Chito" Vera struck a nerve in O'Malley's foot causing a stoppage. Going into UFC 292, Sean O'Malley was 16-1 with 7 TKO's.

O'Malley's opponent was Aljamain Sterling, the Bantamweight Champ at the time. Sterling was 23-3 going into this fight and the favorite according to all sports-books. The story of this fight was always going to be O'Malley's striking versus Sterling's jiu-jitsu. All fight week long, O'Malley had been open about the fact that he was going to do everything in his power to keep the fight standing and Sterling was clear in his approach as well. By the time fight night had rolled around, everybody waited in anticipation for what was going to happen. The way I saw it, the fight was only ending in two ways: An O'Malley TKO, or a Sterling submission victory. 

The first round was very anticlimactic with both fighters getting their range and throwing faints. Sterling took the first round by the judges score cards, but it was extremely close and it really could have gone either way in my eyes. The second round started and immediately Sterling applied pressure on O'Malley. This forced an O'Malley counter which he then proceeded to slip and nearly get taken down by Sterling. This was an extremely impressive showing by O'Malley being able to escape the single leg from Sterling. After getting some distance from Sterling, O'Malley threw a front kick and after Sterling ate it, he charged in on O'Malley looking for a take down. This is where everything slowed down. O'Malley slipped a straight left from Sterling and countered back with a straight right which clipped Sterling across the jaw. The whole arena came to its feet and the TD Garden ignited with energy. After about 10 seconds of ground and pound, the referee stopped the fight and Suga Sean O'Malley was crowned the new Bantamweight Champion. 

In the full scope of the UFC, the Bantamweight division is one of the most talented. This fight firmly places Sean O'Malley in the UFC Pound-For-Pound top ten. To me, what we have seen from O'Malley gives me the confidence to label him as a top three striker in the UFC. It seems like Chito Vera is going to be O'Malley's next opponent, but I don't think that this will be much of a contest. Look for O'Malley to defend his belt against Vera and then either fight Sterling in a rematch or fight Merab Dvalishvili who is currently the number two contender in the Bantamweight Divison. I don't think O'Malley should move up to Featherweight to challenge Alexander Volkanovski, he is just too good. O'Malley should focus on cleaning out the Bantamweight Division and from there make a decision whether to move up or not. 

All things considered, Saturday was a fantastic showing for the biggest star in the UFC, Sean O'Malley. Welcome to the Suga Show.



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