Sean O’Malley already considers himself the most talked about bantamweight on the entire UFC roster, and that’s why he’s not at all surprised that he just got Cody Garbrandt’s attention.
Prior to his flyweight title fight against Deiveson Figueiredo was confirmed this past week, the former bantamweight champion had placed a move to 125 pounds for that exact chance. O’Malley countered with a running emoji, as if to say that Garbrandt fled the bantamweight division after both earned impressive knockouts at UFC 250 and then discussed the possibility of going downhill.
That put off a string of messages that were exchanged between O’Malley and Garbrandt on social media.
While O’Malley is focused on his upcoming fight against Marlon “Chito” Vera at UFC 252, and Garbrandt has now officially moved to flyweight for a shot at the 125-pound title, the outspoken former Contender Series winner certainly enjoyed the back- and forward war of words.
In fact, O’Malley does not actually believe that Garbrandt hung for a fight, but simply the attention that goes along with his drawing power these days.
“I don’t think he wants to fight me,” O’Malley told MMA Fighting when asked about Garbrandt. ‘I’m maybe a little biased … I do not think Cody wants to fight me.
‘I think he sees that fight, I’m tall, I’m tall, I’m precise, I throw straight punches, he throws hooks. He’s 5’3. I’m 6’4. “He does not want that fight. ”
Garbrandt took over with O’Malley to tout himself as the future of the bantamweight division before facing the best fighters in the weight class.
The Ohio resident has stated several times that he was a UFC champion when he was 25 years old, while O’Malley is now starting to crack the top 15 rankings at exactly the same age.
For all the bad blood shared between the fighters, O’Malley sees Garbrandt’s reaction as nothing more than promotional blue proving that he’s already got the attention from the top echelon of the bantamweight division as to whether they want to admit it. or not.
“I think I’ve been in his head,” O’Malley said. ‘I think he probably saw my fight with Jose Quinonez because we had no meat at the time, but I bet he then’ thought ‘I’m going to avoid that fight’.
‘Then I beat Eddie out [Wineland] and he strikes out [Raphael] Assuncao but like I said, I think I said it the other day on a podcast, I respect Cody a lot. He’s not once, not twice cut out, he’s cut out three times in a row and then he comes back and fights a tough guy like Assuncao and he’s done the job. ”
Respect if not, O’Malley just feels like he’s going to be a stylistic nightmare for Garbrandt if the UFC ever matched her.
It does not appear that it will at least be a problem with Garbrandt taking a stick in becoming a two-division champion with his flyweight title fight now scheduled for November, but O’Malley will gladly revisit the topic when the time is right.
“There’s 100 percent respect there, but I just think my skill set versus his skill set, I defeated him,” O’Malley said. ‘That’s what it comes down to and of course not afraid to express how I feel about that fight.
‘He’s just getting hotter, and if anyone talks crap, he’s going to talk crap back. It worked just fine. ”
