Brendan Allen has a theory about the night Sean Strickland got the nod over Khamzat Chimaev, and it does not flatter the champion.
In comments that circulated on Reddit’s r/MMA on Oct. 8, Allen said he doesn’t think Strickland beat Chimaev, even if the judges saw it that way. He said the Chimaev who fought that night was a different fighter from the one he trained with, and that the version he knew from the gym would have finished that night’s Chimaev in a minute and a half at most.
The claim has two parts. Allen thinks Chimaev won and the scorecards say otherwise. He also says something was off with the Chimaev who showed up. He didn’t say what. No injury, illness or other explanation appears in his comments, so the idea of a compromised Chimaev is Allen’s opinion and remains unproven. What gives it weight is that Allen says he has been in a room with Chimaev, which most people scoring at home have not.
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Allen also has history with Strickland. On Nov. 14, 2020, Strickland took a short-notice fight with him at a 195-pound catchweight at UFC Fight Night 182, two weeks after his previous bout, and stopped him by TKO in Round 2. It’s one of seven losses on a 27-7 record that Allen has since built into a top-15 spot. He sits at No. 11 in the Knockout Daily middleweight rankings.
He has a fight in two days, too. Allen headlines UFC Fight Night 290 against Christian Leroy Duncan on Saturday, Oct. 10, his first appearance since June 6.
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Strickland (31-7), the two-time UFC middleweight champion, has been loud in other directions all week. He said he was “contemplating just going to 205, knocking out my contract and scrapping with Jake Paul,” according to a clip posted by Championship Rounds. Responding to Paul on X, he wrote, “I haven’t decided if I want to nuke my contract but I gotta say man putting hands on you sounds way better than the UFC right now.....” Paul had listed Strickland among the opponents he wants before he rests. Strickland also got into a heated exchange in Las Vegas with Nassourdine Imavov, who asked him, “What is your problem? You not sign the contract?”
So the champion is talking about vacating, a top contender is chasing him through Las Vegas about a contract, and a ranked middleweight who already lost to him is relitigating his biggest win. Allen can make that last part a lot louder with a finish over Duncan on Saturday.
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