UFC middleweight champion Sean Strickland isn’t the most sentimental man you’ll ever meet, and that extends to his feelings about the 185 pound belt he now carries.
Strickland is set to face Dricus Du Plessis in the main event of UFC 297 on January 20th. It’ll be his first title defense since taking the title off Israel Adesanya back in September 2023. In a new interview with ESPN’s Megan Olivi, he was asked about how the belt had changed his life.
“You know, it’s hard for me to go to Walmart these days,” Strickland replied. “I go to the Walmart, one of my favorite things to do was to go to Walmart like right before closing time, just wander around and buy all the useless Chinese s— I shouldn’t buy. But now, I’m a little bit too famous for Walmart. Kind of not a huge fan of that.”
“That’s big time famous,” he joked. “You’d be surprised how many UFC fans are at the Walmart.”
Strickland’s popularity has gone through the roof since he beat Adesanya. So what does “Tarzan” attribute to this sudden change in appreciation?
“Most people suck. Most athletes suck,” Sean said. “People like me because they’re like, ‘Oh, that’s my white trash uncle that I used to hang out with! I know that guy, lookit, he’s famous, he’s making money.’ And then you have the superstars like McGregor who walk around in a f—ing suit and you have all these guys that like — you’re a f—ing punching bag, dude. At what point do you forget that you are? You are a punching bag.”
Strickland will hopefully avoid being too much of a punching bag against the heavy hitting Du Plessis, who has finished five of his six UFC opponents. “Stillknocks” is a dump truck crashing into whomever he fights, while Sean does his best work against people he sucks into a technical striking battle.
He does have a solid X factor: he’s coming into UFC 297 with longtime head coach Erick Nicksick, who led Sean to the title and Francis Ngannou into the very top of the heavyweight boxing game.
This story originally appeared on MMA Mania
