Sean Strickland is finally the owner of title fight history.
On Saturday, Strickland (28-5) shocked the mixed martial arts community by winning the 185-pound title in a five-round decision against Israel Adesanya, who is widely regarded as the greatest middleweight of all time. The main event of UFC 293 at Sydney's Qudos Bank Arena was the middleweight title bout.
Going into Saturday, Michael Bisping, who famously defeated Luke Rockhold in a battle on short notice in 2016, held the record for the biggest upset in a middleweight title fight ever. The betting odds indicated that Strickland's triumph was much less likely to occur: He was a +500 underdog vs. Adesanya, making it the biggest betting upset in a UFC middleweight title match (Bisping was a +400 favorite against Rockhold).
It was made much more unthinkable by the way he accomplished it, convincingly, throughout five rounds.
"Am I f---ing dreaming?" asked Strickland, who earned 49-46 scores from all three judges. "Am I going to wake up? Somebody hit me. Literally, never in a million years did I think I was going to be here."
Adesanya was defending his middleweight title for the first time in his second reign. In April, he defeated Alex Pereira by knockout to win back the 185-pound title.
Dana White, president of the UFC, declared that a rematch between Strickland and Adesanya is "absolutely" necessary.
"The rematch is interesting," White said. "That could be the thing, too. You go into the Pereira fight, it's such a big fight, and then you overlook Strickland? I don't know the answers to these questions, but Israel does and I'm looking forward to hearing them."
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