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Did Sean Strickland’s brawl warrant punishment?
Last Saturday night, at UFC 296, a brawl broke out in the crowd, but it wasn’t between fans, it was between a UFC champion and his next opponent: Sean Strickland and Dricus Du Plessis. The situation was a powder keg bound to explode considering the close proximity of their seating arrangement—which allowed the two to be within talking distance. Dana White would later take responsibility for sitting them so close to each other, claiming he didn’t even realize what he’d done at the time. Sure, Dana, we believe you 100%.
So, with just one row separating them, and with women and children between them and/or around them, they began shouting at each other, taunting and challenging until Strickland stood up, pointed his finger gun at Du Plessis and fired. He then asked a woman and her child to move aside—they just happened to be fellow UFC fighter Gilbert Burns’ wife and kid.
They barely had a chance to get out of the way before Sean leapt at Dricus and pulled his head down and started wailing on him. Multiple videos were shot by fans and media which were immediately circulated. The commentary team would hem and haw about what a bad look it was, but by the end of the broadcast, they were talking it up and aired it as promotional material. The UFC and their satellite accounts began posting it across their socials in the same vein.
The problem here is that brawl could’ve had serious consequences. Either Sean or Dricus could’ve been injured, jeopardizing their January title fight. The other, more obvious issue is the safety of fans in attendance. What if one of them had been injured? The UFC fought tooth and nail to become more mainstream, and now that they’ve basically achieved that, they’ve devolved into something else entirely. Their middleweight champion just full-on assaulted a man with women and children barely able to get out of the way before he did it.
I’m still on the fence with how I feel about it. The UFC started off the year with their CEO slapping his wife on video and basically told us all that his punishment was what people would say about him. I’m pretty confident they don’t care at all about the optics of it. What do you think? Is what Sean Strickland did worth punishment? And by punishment, I mean a fine or suspension or a combination of the two.
What do you think?
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