{"id":576451,"date":"2026-04-02T02:30:20","date_gmt":"2026-04-02T02:30:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/576451\/"},"modified":"2026-04-02T02:30:20","modified_gmt":"2026-04-02T02:30:20","slug":"chael-sonnen-would-be-surprised-if-khamzat-chimaev-finishes-sean-strickland","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/576451\/","title":{"rendered":"Chael Sonnen would be surprised if Khamzat Chimaev finishes Sean Strickland"},"content":{"rendered":"

Chael Sonnen expects Sean Strickland<\/a> to be a stern test for UFC middleweight champion Khamzat Chimaev<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Strickland (30-7 MMA, 17-7 UFC) challenges Chimaev (15-0 MMA, 9-0 UFC) for the middleweight title in the UFC 328 main event on May 9 from Newark, N.J. (Paramount+<\/a>). Strickland is a big underdog going into the fight, but Sonnen says the former champion thrives in that position. At least he did when he dethroned Israel Adesanya at UFC 293<\/a>, something few gave him the chance of doing.<\/p>\n

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“If he got him out of there quickly, that would surprise me,” Sonnen told MMA Junkie. “If he finished him at all, it would surprise me. Strickland is made for long-distance, hard matches. Strickland does his best work, by the way, when he’s counted out.<\/p>\n

“He doesn’t get counted out a lot, but he was a 6-to-1 underdog against Izzy. He’s only a 4-to-1 underdog here. He won all five rounds against Izzy. There’s something about that relieving of pressure and expectation that Sean rises to. I don’t know how that fight’s going to go, but yeah, Sean’s the guy, for sure. If Sean’s not the best fighter in the world, he’s second best.”<\/p>\n

Strickland snapped Anthony Hernandez’s eight-fight winning streak at UFC Fight Night 267<\/a> to earn another title shot. Not only did he beat Hernandez, but he finished him in Round 3.<\/p>\n

This article originally appeared on MMA Junkie: UFC 328: Analyst expects Sean Strickland to challenge Khamzat Chimaev<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Chael Sonnen expects Sean Strickland to be a stern test for UFC middleweight champion Khamzat Chimaev. Strickland (30-7…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":536200,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[444],"tags":[49,48,31771,641,5899,638,1302,35696,82,640],"class_list":{"0":"post-576451","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-chael-sonnen","11":"tag-fighting","12":"tag-khamzat-chimaev","13":"tag-mma","14":"tag-mma-junkie","15":"tag-sean-strickland","16":"tag-sports","17":"tag-ufc"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/576451","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=576451"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/576451\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/536200"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=576451"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=576451"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=576451"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}