{"id":921523,"date":"2026-10-09T06:30:23","date_gmt":"2026-10-09T06:30:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/921523\/"},"modified":"2026-10-09T06:30:23","modified_gmt":"2026-10-09T06:30:23","slug":"sean-strickland-my-heart-just-isnt-in-mma-anymore","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/921523\/","title":{"rendered":"Sean Strickland: &#8220;My Heart Just Isn&#8217;t In MMA Anymore&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"696\" height=\"464\" class=\"entry-thumb webpexpress-processed\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/sstrickland-696x464.jpg\"   alt=\"Sean Strickland, UFC Houston\" title=\"UFC Fight Night: Strickland v Hernandez\"\/>HOUSTON, TEXAS &#8211; FEBRUARY 21: Sean Strickland reacts after a TKO victory against Anthony Hernandez in a middleweight fight during the UFC Fight Night event at Toyota Center on February 21, 2026 in Houston, Texas. (Photo by Cooper Neill\/Zuffa LLC)<\/p>\n<p>Sean Strickland has always been one of the more vocal fighters on the UFC roster, and lately it seems as if he\u2019s had a laundry list of complaints about the promotion.<\/p>\n<p>On Thursday, he went in on his employer, before admitting that his heart simply wasn\u2019t in the sport anymore.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYall I think Im just frustrated because my body is crashing because MMA training is brutal,\u201d Strickland, the reigning UFC middleweight champion, <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/SStricklandMMA\/status\/2108060697490043326\" data-wpel-link=\"external\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"external noopener noreferrer nofollow\">wrote on social media<\/a>. \u201cMy heart just isn\u2019t in MMA anymore. Groin tear, AC joint separation. I just don\u2019t think my heart is in MMA anymore. Boxing there is more money and it\u2019s significantly easier.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Strickland\u2019s comments come after rumors of him turning down a UFC 335 headlining spot against Nassourdine Imavov, reportedly over the purse for the fight. The promotion eventually announced <a href=\"https:\/\/cagesidepress.com\/2026\/10\/03\/charles-oliveira-vs-diego-lopes-bmf-title-fight-tops-ufc-335\/\" data-wpel-link=\"internal\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Charles Oliveira vs. Diego Lopes for the BMF title<\/a> as the December card\u2019s main event.<\/p>\n<p>The two-time middleweight champ also suggested he\u2019s interested in a fight with Jake Paul.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI gotta be honest unless things change with the UFC I\u2019m kinda over it. McGregor makes 30 million to fight for 30 second and they dont want to pay us a fraction of it,\u201d he stated <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/SStricklandMMA\/status\/2107946336758997347\" data-wpel-link=\"external\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"external noopener noreferrer nofollow\">just a day ago<\/a>. \u201cContemplating just going to 205 knocking out my contract and scrapping with Jake Paul. That sounds fun.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Strickland reclaimed the UFC\u2019s 185lb title after winning a split decision against Khamzat Chimaev back in May. While \u201cBorz\u201d had contemplated a move to 205lbs, he later began campaigning for a rematch with Strickland. Neither that fight, nor a match-up with top contender Imavov, has materialized for Strickland as of yet.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"HOUSTON, TEXAS &#8211; FEBRUARY 21: Sean Strickland reacts after a TKO victory against Anthony Hernandez in a middleweight&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":921524,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[570],"tags":[64,63,12059,4736,786,15810,15803,11877,15805,801,10280,785,2843,15808,5963,15804,15809,85,15806,787,15807],"class_list":["post-921523","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mma","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-bellator","tag-conor-mcgregor","tag-fighting","tag-gsp","tag-invicta","tag-jon-jones","tag-lfa","tag-martial-arts","tag-mixed-martial-arts","tag-mma","tag-one-championship","tag-one-fc","tag-pfl","tag-rizin","tag-ronda-rousey","tag-sports","tag-titan-fc","tag-ufc","tag-wsof"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/921523","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=921523"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/921523\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/921524"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=921523"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=921523"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=921523"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}