Midnight Mania! Joe Rogan raves over UFC 297’s Sean Strickland: ‘He never gets tired’

Welcome to Midnight Mania!

UFC color commentator Joe Rogan may not be working UFC 297, but he’s a fan of Middleweight champion Sean Strickland, who will take on Dricus Du Plessis in the main event tomorrow night (Sat. Jan. 20, 2024) from Scotiabank Arena in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Strickland appeared on the Joe Rogan Experience podcast in July 2023, prior to dethroning Israel Adesanya and taking over the championship mantle.

Strickland’s upset over “Stylebender” shocked a wide portion of the MMA community, as Adesanya was heavily favored and had just regained his belt in dramatic fashion. In the immediate aftermath, many questioned if something was wrong with Adesanya, if he was fighting too often or perhaps overlooked Strickland.

Rogan doesn’t believe there’s any truth to that idea. Instead, he thinks that performance was just evidence of Strickland’s talent.

“I was very impressed,” Rogna explained on a recent podcast (via Josh Evanoff). “He’s a big guy man, there’s a thing about being confident and delusional. Or, not respecting your opponent and you know, I don’t know if that’s what happened with [Israel] Adesanya and Strickland. I just think Strickland’s that good, I really do think [so].”

A big question ahead of his first title defense opposite “Stillknocks” is how the South African will fare across five rounds. He has yet to go beyond the third inside the Octagon, and though his nose being fixed is allegedly going to be a boon to his conditioning, we have seen him fatigue previously.

Strickland, meanwhile, can push an incredible pace. Rogan thinks the reason that Strickland never grows tired is because of the mass amounts of sparring in training, which allow him to throw volume at an unusual rate.

Rogan continued, “He never gets tired … I’m very interested to see who prevails. The Abus Magomedov fight, I think that fight was one of the most impressive fights of Strickland’s fights. Abus comes out in that first round like a bat out of hell. But, he just gassed out, and he gassed out at the end of the first round. I think Abus was just so used to taking guys out, he thought he could just put it on Sean, and he was hitting Sean with f—king fire. That dude’s good man, but Sean just wilted him, just wilted him.”

“He doesn’t get tired.” Joe Rogan concluded his praise of Sean Strickland. “When you have a guy who spars as much as Sean. The bulk of Sean’s training is sparring, and he spars hard. He’s so accustomed to that, that’s really like a fight all of the time.”

LIVE! Watch UFC 298 PPV On ESPN+ Here!

WORLD FEATHERWEIGHT CHAMPIONSHIP! Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) returns to Honda Center in Anaheim, Calif., on Sat., Feb. 17, 2024, for the first time in more than two years with its latest pay-per-view (PPV) show. In the ESPN+-streamed PPV main event, reigning Featherweight roost-ruler, Alexander Volkanovski, will defend his 145-pound strap against undefeated surging Spanish contender, Ilia Topuria. In addition, former Middleweight kingpin, Robert Whittaker, will finally square off with mercurial mauler, Paulo Costa, in UFC 298’s co-feature. UFC 298 will also feature the returns of Ian Garry, Geoff Neal, Henry Cejudo, Merab Dvalishvili and so much more!

Don’t miss a single second of EPIC face-punching action!

• STREAM UFC 298

Insomnia

Serious evidence that we should never take anything Dominick Cruz says seriously again.

Alexander Volkov is ready to roll!

Jose Aldo looking like the baddest dude at Disneyland is very funny.

Please, won’t somebody fight Umar Nurmagomedov before he’s forced to write more poetry?

It’s still a shame that Murphy is hurt, but Ige vs. Fili is a banger!

I would humbly request all my readers cheer for Mike Malott. He’s a great guy!

Lyoto Machida breaks down his legendary match up opposite BJ Penn.

Slips, rips, and KO clips

My hot take on the UFC Hall of Fame and Jim Miller’s potential inclusion is that it’s meaningless, because there are a bunch of worthy champions outside of its ranks.

John Cholish, now there’s a name I haven’t thought about in a while!

Some really quick transitions en route to this submission finish:

Random Land

Portland + winter weather = comedic gold.

Midnight Music: Chamber pop, 2023

Sleep well Maniacs! More martial arts madness is always on the way.