Belal Muhammad isn’t as forgiving as Khamzat Chimaev when it comes to Sean Strickland‘s hateful remarks against Islam.
After dethroning Chimaev (15-1 MMA, 9-1 UFC) to claim the middleweight title in Saturday’s UFC 328 headliner, Strickland (31-7 MMA, 18-7 UFC) apologized for his derogatory comments made towards Muslims.
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Chimaev accepted his apology, and the pair hugged it out in the octagon. However, former UFC welterweight champion Muhammad (24-5 MMA, 15-5 UFC) doesn’t feel the same way.
“Even though the clown apologized, ‘I apologized to my Muslim fans, I was just promoting a fight,'” Muhammad said on his YouTube channel. “No, it’s not promoting a fight when you’re talking about religion. He always plays that role of saying stupid stuff and then afterward, ‘I love this guy. This guy’s the best,’ blah blah, blah. When you talk about religion, you talk about family, that hits different. I hope to one day step in the cage with that clown before it’s all said and done and just make him bleed.”
Strickland defeated Chimaev by split decision – a decision that’s still being debated. Muhammad thinks the judges were influenced after Chimaev didn’t live up to what the betting odds suggested.
“I still thought he won the fight 3-2 if I’m being honest,” Muhammad said of Chimaev. “I thought he was landing harder shots on the feet. Strickland was landing a lot of jabs. He defended a couple of takedowns. But damage wise, he did break Strickland’s nose, but Khamzat was a little beat up himself. He did have a swollen face, lips. I think it also comes down to the judges assuming that Khamzat could only win by taking him down.
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“And the fact that he stayed on his feet, people were assuming something was wrong. He didn’t look good. He can’t compete with him on the feet. All that stuff plays a factor into judging a fight. Even in the Islam (Makhachev)-Volkanovski first fight were people were like Islam couldn’t get the takedown a couple of times, even though he was landing good strikes on the feet, they were like he lost just because they expected him to go in there and dominate. They expected Khamzat to go in there and dominate.”
This article originally appeared on MMA Junkie: Belal Muhammad doesn’t forgive Sean Strickland for bashing Muslims
