Eric Nicksick is doing his best. He’s trying to ensure that Sean Strickland’s recent brawl with Dricus Du Plessis doesn’t emotionally drain him. After all, Strickland is the UFC middleweight champion.
Strickland is set to defend his title against Du Plessis. The big event is UFC 297 on January 20 in Toronto. The tension between the two fighters started during a recent press conference. Strickland’s troubled childhood was brought up by “Stillknocks.”
The feud escalated at UFC 296 the following day. Strickland was seen attacking Du Plessis after a verbal spat. The incident ended with Strickland being escorted out of the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.
Nicksick, Strickland’s head coach at Xtreme Couture, admits the altercation triggered his champ. But, he claims he’s ensured Strickland uses the incident as motivation for their upcoming fight. Nicksick told MMAjunkie.com, “There’s two sides to that coin: Sean has no problem saying what he says about everybody else, so people are going to probably poke and say things about him, as well.”
He added, “I think it’s a tough row to [hoe], so you can’t get too emotional about those situations. They are just words, but at the end of the day, I did feel like he was triggered and there was a few days where it just kind of motivated him.”
Nicksick wanted Strickland to have the right motivation. He said, “It didn’t need to be this infuriated guy going in there like, ‘I want to kill this guy,’ because that takes us out of our game.” He’s had a good conversation with Strickland about it and told him he was proud of him.
Nicksick also warned Strickland about fighting emotionally. He said, “Stylistically, I think that favors Dricus more. It opens us up more, so we need to stick with our game plan and stick with what we want to do and don’t allow your emotions to take this over.”
Strickland will be making his first title defense at UFC 297. He had an upset win over Israel Adesanya at UFC 293 in September. His South African opponent, on the other hand, is on a six-fight UFC winning streak. This includes a knockout win over former champ Robert Whittaker last July.