Aljamain Sterling ran through Cory Sandhagen en route to becoming UFC champion, and as he recalls, Sandhagen had a strong response in the aftermath of the fight.
At UFC 250 in June 2020, Sterling and Sandhagen faced off on the main card with the winner expected to go on to challenge Petr Yan for the bantamweight title. On that night, it was Sterling who left no doubt he was the rightful No. 1 contender as he grounded Sandhagen and tapped him out with a rear-naked choke in under 90 seconds.
Sterling was reminded of the brief encounter on his YouTube channel, and had a laugh remembering what Sandhagen said to him when they later had a brief encounter.
“I saw him later that night in the courtyard and basically he said, ‘Congrats, you f*cking asshole,’” Sterling said. “I was just like, ‘Fair.’
“What can I say to that? You got it. I’ll take that.”
The incident came up as Sterling and his co-hosts discussed the sportsmanship displayed by Andre Fili this past Saturday at UFC Vegas 122. Fili scored an incredible head kick knockout over Kai Kamaka III and managed to stop himself from doing any further damage as he immediately realized that Kamaka wasn’t getting back up. The featherweight veteran later said, “I’m a criminal, but I’m not a piece of shit,” explaining why he held back.
Sterling has suffered two knockout losses in his career, the first a brutal knee KO against Marlon Moraes, and he had another laugh when asked if it would have meant something for Moraes to check on him after.
“No,” Sterling said. “Absolutely not. For what?”
All of that said, Sterling called Fili’s show of restraint admirable, especially when it’s not always the fighter’s responsibility to determine when a fight is truly over.
“It reminds me of my fight with Marlon Moraes, after the knee landed, he just looked and was like, ‘Oh, this guy’s dead,’” Sterling said. “So Fili ran over like he was about to hit him one more time in case he woke up and he was just like, ‘He’s already out, this guy’s done.’ So good on him, good control for him to do that.
“I like seeing stuff like that. Being able to show that you’re still present and you’re not just—The guy’s got a family, man. So I always respect that, because you could easily go it’s the ref’s fault, you could easily go it’s Herb Dean’s fault for not pulling me off and go the Derrick Lewis route like that’s not my fault, so kudos to him for that.”
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