Former UFC bantamweight champion Aljamain Sterling has blasted Sean O’Malley’s coach Tim Welch as an ‘interference’ video goes viral on social media.
The typically soft-spoken Aljamain Sterling certainly chose not to mince his words as he slammed Sean O’Malley’s head coach Tim Welch, claiming that he wanted to slap the veteran trainer during their UFC 292 title fight back in Boston.
Footage appears to show O’Malley’s coach pretending to be Sterling’s corner
Over the past 24 hours or so, footage from Aljamain Sterling vs Sean O’Malley has gone viral online after the UFC posted a video of the bantamweight title fight without the audio track from the commentary booth.
In the video, fans hear and see head coach Tim Welch imitating Sterling’s corner as he shouts “Aljo, you gotta go!” – before ‘Funkmaster’ uncharacteristically rushes forward to be knocked out only mere seconds later.
The unique footage has certainly caused a stir in the MMA community, with both Aljamain Sterling and Tim Welch opting to hurl harsh insults at each other on social media in response.
Aljamain Sterling slams coach Tim Welch for interference in UFC title fight
The Twitter (X) thread started when top contender Merab Dvalishvili posted “I will smash O’Malley inside the cage and then smash his coach outside the cage,” to which Welch replied: “Are you mad I said your nose is big brother.”
Sterling then launched a series of attacks against Welch for “talking s*** [and] clout chasing,” advising the coach to “let your fighter talk s***, you don’t scrap anymore Jimmy Neutron.”
“You talked hella s*** during my fight with Sean. The ref had to tell you to stfu multiple times. I wanted to slap you in between rounds and I regret not taking the fine for that. You should know better as a former fighter and a current coach.”
The former bantamweight king stated, “You don’t need to be chiming in on the s*** talk unless you want the problems as well. It’s that simple bro.”
Welch responded by claiming that he’s only been talking about Dvalishvili “because I know how dangerous he is” in anticipation of the expected title fight later this year, adding “I don’t mind a little dust up here and there, all good fun.”
“Dust ups are cool for the FIGHTERS BRO. Not the coach,” argued ‘Funkmaster’ in return, before revealing that Welch has a history of trying to call out the wrong advice to his fighters’ opponents in the UFC:
“You crossed the line multiple times which is why merab said he will fight you too. Same s*** when we almost fought Cejudos team. They were talking s*** as if they were fighting. You making yourself fair game. That’s all I’m saying.”
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John McCarthy weighs in on situation from referee’s perspective
Yet aside from the entertaining back-and-forth on social media, there’s also an interesting conversation surrounding whether what Tim Welch did would technically be cause for official intervention.
Luckily, the MMA community has veteran referee John McCarthy to fall back on for expert guidance, who revealed that the sport used to have a rule against a corner talking to an opponent – but that rule is no longer utilized in the same way:
“Well, we used to have a rule stating that a corner person could not speak to their fighters opponent during the contest. When the Unified Rules came into effect we used: Interference from a mixed martial artist’s corner or seconds; a. Interference is defined as any action or [b.] activity aimed at disrupting the fight or causing an unfair advantage to be given to a corner’s combatant.”
“Corners are not allowed to distract the referee or influence the actions of the referee in any fashion,” added the veteran referee, before ultimately giving his conclusion on the legality of Welch’s impersonation:
“Does this type of action fit within the criteria to say that a foul was committed…… I think you really have to be stretching to think so.”
Aljamain Sterling recently earned a unanimous decision victory over Calvin Kattar at UFC 300, whilst Sean O’Malley vs Merab Dvalishvili is expected to take place later this summer.