{"id":391091,"date":"2026-01-06T05:36:08","date_gmt":"2026-01-06T05:36:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/391091\/"},"modified":"2026-01-06T05:36:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-06T05:36:08","slug":"sean-omalley-eyes-lit-2026-this-might-be-the-last-suga-year-ever","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/391091\/","title":{"rendered":"Sean O&#8217;Malley eyes &#8220;lit&#8221; 2026: &#8220;This might be the last \u2018Suga\u2019 year ever&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Sean O\u2019Malley is eyeing a massive run this calendar year, but also mentioned that 2o26 may be the last time we see the colourful MMA star. The former UFC bantamweight champion is working toward another chance to become kingpin of 135 pounds, with his potential path back to gold going through Song Yadong at UFC 324 in the coming weeks.<\/p>\n<p>His focus extends beyond Yadong on the 24th though, and \u2018Suga\u2019 has a prominent former opponent in his crosshairs for a subsequent octagon clash later on this year. The former UFC titleholder prefaced his claims by touting Yadong as dangerous and saying he wasn\u2019t overlooking the surging contender but rather that he was concurrently preparing for Yadong as well as former foe\/ current champ, Petr Yan.<\/p>\n<p>Expounding upon his thought processes for the coming twelve some-odd months, O\u2019Malley said [via <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mmafighting.com\/ufc\/464693\/sean-omalley-might-call-it-quits-soon-this-might-be-the-last-suga-year-ever\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">MMA Fighting<\/a>],<\/p>\n<p>\u201cPetr [Yan] knows. That\u2019s what\u2019s next. I\u2019m going to go out there, take care of Song [Yadong], and that\u2019s what\u2019s next. It just makes sense. 2026 is about to be lit. I\u2019m going to go out there, take care of Song, take care of Petr, DoingWell [O\u2019Malley\u2019s new business venture] is going to blow up. I\u2019m going to retire. This might be the last \u2018Suga\u2019 year ever.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Sean O\u2019Malley \u201cI\u2019m done with this s**t\u201d if multiple losses transpire<\/p>\n<p>Sean O\u2019Malley bested <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bjpenn.com\/mma-news\/petr-yan\/petr-yan-accomplishes-an-unprecedented-feat-with-ufc-323-title-win\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Petr Yan<\/a> by way of split decision at UFC 280 during the former\u2019s rise toward his own bantamweight title shot. Considering his cache as a combat star, a strong win over Yadong, coupled with his Yan history, could possibly net O\u2019Malley another crack at gold.<\/p>\n<p>There was an obvious tongue-in-cheek dynamic to referencing hanging up the gloves, but further delving into his thought processes for his next fights, O\u2019Malley stated [via MMA Fighting],<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s almost so pointless to predict what I want to do in the next five years, two years, three years. Take it one fight [at a time]. If I go out there and lose and lose, I\u2019m done with this s**t. \u2026 Ideally, I go out there and take care of<a href=\"https:\/\/www.bjpenn.com\/mma-news\/sean-omalley\/sean-omalleys-coach-wants-a-january-ufc-return\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"> Song [Yadong]<\/a>, and then get that Petr fight. And then we\u2019ll just go from there. See what life throws at me.\u201d<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sean O\u2019Malley is eyeing a massive run this calendar year, but also mentioned that 2o26 may be the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":391092,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[444],"tags":[49,48,641,638,12542,82,640],"class_list":{"0":"post-391091","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mma","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-fighting","11":"tag-mma","12":"tag-sean-omalley","13":"tag-sports","14":"tag-ufc"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/391091","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=391091"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/391091\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/391092"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=391091"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=391091"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=391091"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}