Earlier this week, we wrote about the physical altercation between Orlando Sanchez and UFC fighter Sean Strickland. Strickland interpreted one move from Sanchez (Mir Lock) as a dirty move with the intention of hurting him. That resulted in Strickland trying to kick and punch Sanchez.
Orlando Sanchez reacted very calmly to everything while trying to explain and calm Strickland down.
Yesterday, Orlando Sanchez gave an interview for Flograppling in which he explained what actually happened and how it all started.
“Everybody thinks this guy was my training partner. I never met him before in my life. I have no clue who he is, who he was, nothing. Never heard of him before. We were just hanging at the RVCA training center. I was with my friend Cartel. We were doing some boxing and footwork, having fun. It was my boxing coach’s birthday and we were having a good time.”
“So, there was a guy there and I have never seen him in my life. That guy was just talking shit. He was sparring with one of our friends and he just kept running his mouth. But it wasn’t my business so I stayed out of it.”
“Then he came where we were standing. He immediately started bragging about how my big boy Cartel doesn’t belong in the gym. “You can always tell when someone doesn’t belong in the gym when they’re doing stupid shit like wearing a cap on their head in the boxing ring”. He was just talking shit and then he said he’ll do few more wrestling rounds.”
“Then, the coach really wanted him to grapple with me. He was saying “do round with Orlando, do round with Orlando”.”
“That’s where he went like, “who the fuck is Orlando”?. I said I don’t know, I’m nobody. Someone told him, he’s Jiu-Jitsu World Champion. “
“He said like, Jiu-Jitsu world champion (while shaking his fist up and down), this is what I think about Jiu-jitsu.”
“That still didn’t bother me at all.”
“He started talking more shit about Jiu-Jitsu. He came over and asked me what I do? Jiu-Jitsu, wrestle… but he continued, regardless of who you are I’m still gonna beat the shit out of you.”
“At this point, I was like who is he talking to. I wasn’t sure he’s talking to me.”
“Coach jumped in and told both of us to go and grapple. That’s where the video starts.”
“Now, everybody is making it out like he’s my training partner, I have to take care of him, etc. Well, he’s just a guy who told me he’ll beat my ass.”
“I showed him that I was under control from the get-go. That’s basically all I did. Nothing to hurt him, nothing to be a dick. Those of you who know me know I would never do something to hurt my training partners. I just wanted to show who’s in charge (laugh).”
On a question, “do you think it was a dirty move?”, Orlando answered:
“If you’re going to hold it cranking, even then it’s not a dirty move. I don’t know why people are calling it a dirty move. If you’re holding it and cranking it, and guy taps and you won’t let go then it’s a dirty move. But the way I did it, no. I was in control. I knew how far I pushed it. “
“It was just a little wake him up move.”
“He reacted as you saw but he apologized right after the video. We were cool. He said I’m sorry for my reaction, I reacted like an idiot.”
“It’s all good for me. I’m training and fighting for so many years and things are way worse in the gym. It’s just this Internet thing right now. people are making fake accounts saying they want to kill my mom. It’s insane. It’s a wild s… over an arm crank.”
People said they were super impressed with your reaction?
“He was acting like an MF ninja. I defended his punch and strike and I was like WTF?”
“My point is that you can’t go with “I’m gonna beat the f… out of you and not get a reaction.”
“I got hundreds and hundreds of messages from people saying they wanted me to beat his a#$. He beats all training partners. He’s a bully.”
“I don’t know anything about him, I just know he knocked someone out two days before that.”
“Just don’t tell me you’ll beat my a#$ off and then get mad when I do something.”
Orlando sent a message to everyone in Jiu-Jitsu community who are “attacking” him online for the last few days.
“All you Jiu-Jitsu f. nerds who are talking s… I was defending Jiu-jitsu. So, come on, apologize MFs.”
At the end of the interview, Orlando Sanchez sent a message to Strickland himself and gave his opinion.
“Sean is all good. I have no problem with him. I wish him all the best. I hope he beats Urijah Hall in his upcoming fight.”
