I guess Sean Strickland was eager to fight.
UFC 317 was this past weekend, but The former UFC Middleweight Champion was nowhere to be seen at the pay-per-view. Instead, Sean Strickland was at the Tuff-N-Uff 145 pay-per-view as one of the cornermen for Miles Hunsinger. It’s not clear when the beef between Luis Hernandez and Sean Strickland started, but the video cuts into Hernandez getting a submission win via guillotine.
Then he taunts someone at the corner, though it’s never shown who. Hernandez goes back to his opponent and give him his respect. However, Strickland storms into the octagon and instantly throws hands with the mma fighter.
The altercation was stopped very quickly and Hernandez barely seems fazed over what just happened. According to Sean Strickland, Hernandez was insulting him throughout the entire fight.
However, MMA Fighting interviewed Luis Hernandez and he goes into detail on how the entire thing escalated into the viral moment of Strickland throwing hands with the undefeated fighter.
“So when I saw them walking out from their corner, I don’t want to go too crazy on details, but I noticed they looked at me and they laughed,” Hernandez said. “They said something, I think he said something to one of the other corner men — I know it’s like three of them — they said something and they started laughing at me. And I was like, man, I’m not a joke. I believe I am the real deal. I’ve got 11 fights, six pro fight finishes now and five finishes in amateur.
“So they [were] probably [thinking], ‘Oh yeah, this guy’s a cop,’ and they looked at me and I saw them laughing and I was like, ‘Oh, OK, you’re going to laugh at me? I’m going to get the last laugh.’ And some things were said... I’m trying to remember everything now, but I was having a great time. I just wanted to have fun. When the whole moment happened itself, you see me laughing. I want to show that there’s two sides: I have my career, and then inside the cage, I’m able to have fun. This is literally fun for me. I enjoy it. This is my passion.
Hernandez was actually surprised when Strickland stepped into the octagon and though the incident happened out of the blue, he would be down to fight the former UFC Middleweight Champion in the future.
“I was like, ‘What’s going on here? Is this a reality TV show?,’” Hernandez explained. “I felt like I was almost in, you know how they have the Russian [version of] TUF? You know how on the Russian TUF people just start fighting? I was like, ‘What’s going on here?’ I was like, damn.
“I actually like Sean Strickland. I wasn’t expecting it to escalate to that level at all, because I’m like, man, I hope he knows I’m a professional fighter, but I’m a cop, too. You’re swinging on somebody for I don’t know what reason. It was something I wasn’t expecting at all. ... There’s some angles [of the punches] and I said it [in the post-fight interview], he hit me and I’m still standing. I’m still smiling, still look good. These [marks on my face] are actually from Miles. Maybe one of these might have been from Strickland, but I wasn’t expecting that at all. If this was a sanctioned bout, we can do it. I’ll do it for money.
“If me and Strickland want to fight for money, I’ll do it for money. I wasn’t expecting an unsanctioned fight, but if this would be a matchup in the future, most definitely I’ll do it, 100 percent.”
Strickland hasn’t responded to the interview as of this writing. We likely won't see them square up anytime soon, though Hernandez is currently undefeated, so he could be the next big thing if he keeps his streak alive.