Sean Strickland has been told by one in every of MMA’s most divisive figures that he’s ‘not an actual martial artist’ for his hard sparring with beginner celebrities.
Strickland is a former middleweight world champion with wins over the likes of Israel Adesanya and Paulo Costa. But despite having a dangerous skillset, he has no problem utilizing all of his tools to brutalize celebrities once they come to the Xtreme Couture gym to film videos or streams.
Strickland infamously battered and bloodied streamer Sneako on the gym, ignoring multiple towel throws in an effort to place the creator down. And he did the very same to YouTuber Nick Nayersina a 12 months later, beating him even perhaps more brutally after months of callouts.
Sean Strickland seems to enjoy beating up beginners in sparring
Sean Strickland, despite being a trained UFC championship-level fighter, has no problem using his skills to remind beginners just how much of a skill chasm there may be between civilians and fighters. He’s infamous for beating up on celebrities comparable to Sneako and Nick Nayersina.
In February of 2024, while Sneako was visiting the Las Vegas gym, Strickland invited him in for a sparring session. He proceeded to beat the brakes off the streamer, who captured all of it for viral clips on his live broadcast.
A 12 months later, YouTuber Nick Nayersina jokingly called Strickland out for a fight of his own, and was given it in brutal fashion. He was battered from pillar to post and compelled to quit, with many fans noting that it’s bizarre for Strickland to enjoy this bullying behavior a lot.
What makes Strickland’s behavior all of the more comical is that he developed a status for being someone who’s all the time on and all the time spars prefer it’s a fight. That’s unless you catch footage of him with the likes of Alex Pereira, with whom he’s blissful to calmly spar.
Dillon Danis slams Sean Strickland as ‘not an actual martial artist’
One man who’s unimpressed by Strickland’s carry on is the divisive former Bellator star Dillon Danis. A black belt in jiu-jitsu, he recently took on YouTuber Wade Plemons in a sparring session where he managed to point out the degrees of their skills without viciously hurting him.
And Danis feels it’s indicative of a poor martial artist to behave that way with beginners, asking Plemons: “What do I even have to prove me getting in there and knocking you out? Have a look at Strickland, a UFC champion saying ‘yeah I’m going to go and hurt anyone’. That’s not an actual martial artist.”
Danis hasn’t had the possibility to compete in MMA at all around the past six years, but he has stayed training. Now, he returns on a Misfits Boxing event, where he’ll tackle Warren Spencer contained in the ring, but under full skilled MMA rules.