Unexpected rivalries have been sprouting across the UFC landscape and this includes a surprising rivalry between bantamweight champion Sean O’Malley and flyweight champion Alexandre Pantoja. The pair have been at each other’s throats after ‘Cannibal’ claimed that he gave the bantamweight champion a hard time when they sparred a few years ago. This statement by Pantoja enraged ‘Suga.’ who then broke an unspoken rule and it hasn’t gone down well with the fans.

The beef between the pair started around August 2023, shortly after Pantoja and O’Malley had won their respective titles. The flyweight champion claimed he was interested in fighting O’Malley because “he talks too much…” In response, O’Malley called back to their sparring session from 2015, where he allegedly finished the Brazilian in the first round. This beef went cold a while later but is now heating up again.

In a recent conversation with the media, Pantoja said that ahead of his debut fight in the UFC, O’Malley was brought in as a sparring partner and he effectively defeated the bantamweight champion. He further added that one of ‘Suga’s friends had the footage, however, they both refused to share it. Plus, it’s an unspoken code that fighters don’t usually release sparring footage to demean another fighter, but rather keep them for studying their skills.

“He said some bad things about that [sparring] but that’s crazy because he recorded the sparring and at the end of training I said, ‘Hey send to me the video and then I can see our training’ and he never passed the training to me. I asked [his friend] ‘Can you talk with your friend for send the video’, and he said to me ‘Hey, he’s not gonna send to you bro, you smashed him,’” said Pantoja.

In response, O’Malley teased the fans with a few seconds from their now-controversial sparring clip. “I don’t know why he brought it up. I literally finished him in the first round with a liver kick,” O’Malley said. In the few seconds of the footage that the 135 lbs champion shared, all we can see is O’Malley taking down Pantoja after setting him up with strikes. But here’s an interesting catch. O’Malley never really denied Pantoja’s claims. His explanation is reliant on the specifics of the sparring session.

Back in 2023, O’Malley said that he was up 2-0 against Pantoja. Since he was coming off the couch to spar with the Brazilian he gassed out after the first two rounds. O’Malley allegedly finished Pantoja in the opening round. This irked the latter’s team, including fellow bantamweight Henry Cejudo, who called for two more rounds with the Arizona native. O’Malley claims to have won the second round as well but admitted to being tired and getting choked out in the third. So, if this was an actual fight, then O’Malley secured the win in the first round, or so his point translates.

O’Malley has now released the footage showing he was dominating Pantoja for a brief moment. However, there’s a mystery behind it. What, you ask? Well, O’Malley paused the video at an exact point where it could be seen that Pantoja was starting to defend. This unnecessary pause raised suspicion from the fans.

Fans left divided as Sean O’Malley releases Alexandre Pantoja sparring footage

Sean O’Malley might have shared the video finally, but it has worked against him as the fans have now raised doubts over his authenticity. Towards the end of the footage, O’Malley  said, “I’m not gonna show you the finish, because that’s just mean.” Starting off, a fan stated that O’Malley willingly paused the video at the right moment to fit his narrative: “Gatekeeping the entire sparring footage and only showing us a takedown is crazy.” 

Meanwhile, another fan provided a reality check to everyone debating a potential fight, stating the arm reach between both fighters. To put it into perspective, O’Malley has a reach of 72, while on the other hand, Pantoja has a reach of 67. This 5-inch gap plays a very big role in terms of fighting: “Do yall realize how much bigger Sean is than pantoja? He would sit at distance and literally do whatever he wanted to him lol wouldn’t be competitive at all.”

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Moreover, another fan advised O’Malley to worry about the problem at hand, Merab Dvalishvili. The Georgian recently claimed that his title fight against Sean was a lock of UFC 306 at the Las Vegas Sphere. However, O’Malley was quick to dismiss this claim, while adding that he too has been pushing for the same. The fan reminded O’Malley, “Just worry about morab.” 

With the current state of the flyweight division, it would not be out of the realm of possibility for Pantoja to move up. His UFC 301 opponent was #10 ranked Steve Erceg, clearly indicating a lack of (fresh) contenders for the champion. One fan said that both O’Malley and Pantoja were setting the stage for ‘Cannibal’ to move up the division to fight him in a champ vs. champ fight: “They’re setting up their fight if Pantoja goes up.” 

Interestingly, a fan highlighted another code violation from O’Malley (the first being sharing the sparring footage). They recalled that Conor McGregor called out both Ryan Garcia and Sean O’Malley for using banned substances. The former dual weight champion went off on O’Malley after Garcia was caught using Ostarine. “You heard what mcgregor said about O Malley is a ped user”

Last but not least, a fan suggested the bantamweight champion show the full footage as it could give Pantoja a reason to move up the division: “Just show it Sean it’ll lead up to a big build up if he goes for double champ status.”

The champ vs. champ feud might turn into a potential match in the future. However, for now, O’Malley’s move seems to have backfired. Do you think O’Malley should have released the footage? State your thoughts in the comments below.