Sean O’Malley: Aljamain Sterling Might Be Too ‘Insecure’ to Move Up to Featherweight

Sean O'Malley believes that Aljamain Sterling might do well at featherweight but is unsure whether we will get to find out.

In an appearance on The MMA Hour, O’Malley expressed his doubts over whether Sterling, whose Ultimate Fighting Championship bantamweight title he took via second-round knockout at UFC 292 in August, has enough confidence to move up to featherweight. While “Funkmaster” initially lobbied for an immediate rematch, he has since changed course towards a possible move up to 145 pounds. Sterling recently revealed that he has been offered a booking against perennial featherweight contender Calvin Kattar but is keener on a clash against former champ Max Holloway.

O’Malley believes going up makes sense for Sterling given the latter’s natural size. While “Sugar” believes Sterling also the required skillset for featherweight, he believes the former champ might prefer sticking around at bantamweight for the size advantage. O’Malley said on The MMA Hour:

“I think if he goes up to 145, it’d be super interesting. I think there’s a lot of interesting fights up there at ‘45, I think his weight gets big enough for that. You know, I’m probably 160 right now, I probably not getting over this. He’s probably 175. Like, it just doesn’t make sense to go back to 135, for his health, for his longevity […] He’ll probably go back down to 135, just because he’s insecure and he wants to be stronger and bigger than these guys. Why else would he not fight at 145? It’s not like his skills aren’t there. His skills, he’s good. Not as good as me, but he’s good. You know what I mean? He could go up to 145, I think he’d do fine up there.”

Meanwhile, O’Malley is slated to make his first title defence at UFC 299 in March in a grudge rematch against Marlon Vera, who handed the champ his lone professional loss in 2020.