After an upset win over Petr Yan at UFC 280, Sean O’Malley has catapulted a whopping 10 places up the bantamweight rankings and could well be in line for a bantamweight title shot against Aljamain Sterling next year.
However, in the mean time ‘Suga’ has suggested that there’s one potential fight that would be an even bigger draw than that – a rematch against Marlon ‘Chito’ Vera, who handed him the only loss of his career back in 2020 when he TKO’d him late in the opening round after damaging his leg with a kick.
“I’ve been saying it since a couple of days after that fight,” O’Malley said on The MMA Hour. “It’ll happen when it’s ready. It’s going to be a massive fight. It’s going to be a big fight. Me versus ‘Chito’ is the biggest fight in the division right now.”
“I’d say me versus ‘Chito’ is a bigger fight than me versus ‘Aljo’ as far as numbers-wise,” continued O’Malley. “I think that’s a massive fight that’s going to happen in 2023, 2024. I can’t imagine it not happening next year at some point.”
Since that loss O’Malley has quickly got back to winning ways and is unbeaten in his last five fights, taking his overall career record to 16-1 (+1nc).
