Sean Strickland’s first title defense of his second middleweight reign is shaping up for February in Florida. His opponent is Nassourdine Imavov, a man he already beat in January 2023.
MMA Junkie’s Mike Bohn floated the date on his podcast The Bohnfire, talking with co-host Luke Thomas. He sounded about as confident as anyone gets without a bout agreement in hand.
“It’s going to be Imavov next,” Bohn said. “I’ve heard it’s maybe even signed or close to signed for February for somewhere in Florida so I think this fight is happening.”
Thomas said he’d “heard similar,” which is the podcast version of a second witness.
This wasn’t the original plan. Strickland was expected to headline UFC 335 in December in Las Vegas, his adopted hometown, with Imavov as the near-certain opponent. That card slipped away from him when the champion and the UFC got crosswise over his purses. Bloody Elbow, summarizing the reporting, wrote that the money issue appears to have been sorted out, at least well enough to get a fight booked.
There was never much doubt about whether Strickland would fight, only when. He’s locked into a lengthy contract he signed before he got his shot at what was then Khamzat Chimaev’s belt. You can complain about your pay all you want. That paperwork doesn’t care. When you’re tied to a deal like that, the dispute becomes a scheduling problem more than a standoff.
The calendar also did him no favors. The next numbered event after December is UFC 336 in Toronto, and Strickland has said before that he’ll never fight in Canada again. So Toronto was out. That pushes the rematch to the following numbered card, which would make the Florida event the second numbered show of the year.
Chimaev, meanwhile, hasn’t gone quiet. He’s said he’ll chase Strickland across weight classes, so the guy who lost the belt to him is still lurking somewhere down the road. That’s a problem for later. Imavov comes first.
The rematch makes sense on paper. Strickland beat Imavov in their first meeting, and Imavov has spent the time since working his way back into a title fight against the same guy. Strickland likes a fight that gets made without a lot of hand-wringing, and this one mostly was. All it took was a contract he can’t wriggle out of and a country he refuses to visit.
My take: the pay fight was the most Strickland thing possible, and it ended the way these things always end when a fighter has years left on his deal. He grumbled, the UFC moved the date, and he’s still showing up. February in Florida is a perfectly good spot for a middleweight title fight. If Bohn’s “maybe even signed” turns into a real announcement, the champ will have spent the winter mad about money and walked into the cage anyway. I’d rather have that than an interim belt any day.
