Sean Strickland has slammed the new gloves that are set to be introduced this weekend at UFC 302, claiming that the promotion ‘dropped the ball’ in the design.
At UFC 302 this weekend, fighters will be walking to the octagon with some brand-new gloves on their hands; called the 3Eight (for non-championship bouts), and 5Eight (for title fights).
The new gloves are reportedly designed to reduce the number of eye pokes and hand injuries sustained in competition, but there’s been a steady stream of fighters coming out to share their concerns that something’s just not quite right.
Sean Strickland slams the poor quality of new gloves at UFC 302
Speaking during the UFC 302 media day, former middleweight champion Sean Strickland was asked what he thought about the new gloves that he’d be wearing to face Paulo Costa this weekend.
Strickland’s answer was a simple one as ‘Tarzan’ got straight to the point: “Yeah, they suck.”
“Yeah, they suck dude – I don’t know who, like can we talk to the person who designed these gloves; have you ever been in a fight in your f***** life?”
“It’s like you get these f****** dorks that have no idea [and] they’re like ‘Oh this sounds like a good idea, and they make it’.”
Strickland likened the ‘upgrade’ to his experiences purchasing motorcycles, stating that “they put so much stupid s*** on it, like how did you a****** think that this was a good idea? So yeah, they absolutely suck, and the UFC dropped the ball on that one.”
When asked to explain what about the gloves weren’t up to his liking, Strickland noted that the issue is that there was no issue in the first place:
“What was the reasoning that they wanted so people stopped poking people in the eyes? Well, they’re a little bit more like stitched and at the end of the day, people getting f**** poked in the eye because they open their hands.”
“Unless you put a boxing glove on, that s*** ain’t going to stop so it’s just people creating a problem that we did not have,” argued the ever-entertaining American.
“If you get cut because you got hit in the f***** head, don’t get hit in the f****** head and you don’t get cut. If you get poked in the eye because you f***** opened your hand, don’t open your hand and you won’t get poked in the eye… It’s people creating problems that weren’t there.”
Strickland isn’t the only UFC fighter concerned over the new equipment
Strickland might have offered the most openly negative review of the new UFC gloves so far, but the fan-favorite middleweight certainly isn’t the only top-tier fighter who is concerned about the new equipment.
Earlier in the week, lightweight champion and UFC 302 headliner Islam Makhachev explained how “They are very stiff [and] as I’ve told you, they will lead to more cuts – as the previous UFC gloves were softer [whereas] these are stiffer.”
“They don’t let you fully open your hand just to make sure the fingers don’t extend straight forward but overall; they are pretty much the same.”
Similarly, fellow UFC 302 fighter Randy Brown also identified that the gloves, whilst designed to reduce eye pokes, could cause more potentially fight-ending cuts and abrasions in the octagon:
“Another thing that I did notice, check out how much that [leather] comes off from my fingers,” explained ‘Rudeboy’, pulling back the leather seems from the finger holes in his YouTube breakdown video:
“These come off really far [away] from my outer knuckles so I do think that can cause a little bit more cuts for grazing shots [and] scrape you… I’m thinking about that and I’m keeping an eye on that, but that was one of the first things I noticed as a con.”
Sean Strickland takes on Paulo Costa in the co-main event of UFC 302 this weekend, live from the Prudential Center in Newark, New Jersey.