Outside Source
Strickland looked to reclaim his middleweight title in a rematch against Dricus Du Plessis at UFC 312 in February 2025. Strickland dropped a lopsided unanimous decision against the champion. Nicksick seemingly just failed to get his fighter going despite his best efforts. The Xtreme Couture coach subsequently lashed out at Strickland publicly, calling the performance “underwhelming.” Strickland responded, saying Nicksick would most likely not remain his coach any longer. However, they buried the hatchet soon after, and Strickland still continues to train under the tutelage of Nicksick at Xtreme Couture.
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Reflecting on the brief spat, Nicksick recently admitted that he deserves criticism. Nicksick revealed that he was also dealing with a lot in his personal life, which, added to Strickland’s performance, made him lash out at the former middleweight champion. Nicksick doesn’t regret what he said as he believes he was accurate with his analysis. However, Nicksick regrets voicing his harsh opinion about his fighter publicly. Nicksick claims he and Strickland had sorted their differences within days of the public rift.
It Made Me a Better Person
“I think that that criticism was just,” Nicksick told MMAjunkie.com. “On a personal level I was going through a lot in my life, my dad was battling prostate cancer, my daughter was doing all these competitions, so I was missing a lot of stuff at home. So that added stress to me as a coach, but also underwhelming performance and knowing Sean was injured and all these things. I took it out on a platform that I shouldn’t have… I don’t regret what I said, because what I said was spot on. I regret the platform that I said it on. But I learned a lot from that… In retrospect, looking back at it, I am glad it happened. It made me a better person because of me. Sean and me were literally fine a week or two after.”
Nicksick has since guided Strickland (30-7) to an upset win over Anthony Hernandez via stoppage at UFC Houston this past February. Strickland is now set to challenge Khamzat Chimaev (15-0) for the middleweight title in the main event at UFC 328 on May 9 at the Prudential Center in Newark, New Jersey.
This article first appeared at Recent News on Sherdog.com
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