WATCH: Aljamain Sterling shows off gaining a staggering 40+ lbs 5 days post- Sean O'Malley fight
This Saturday marks a week since Aljamain Sterling was violently knocked out by Sean O’Malley in the headliner of UFC 292, losing his bantamweight title in the process.
‘The Funk Master’ came into the fight as the betting favourite, but ate a perfectly-timed right-hand counterpunch in the second round and succumbed to a TKO shortly afterwards.
Right now, it’s unknown when Aljamain Sterling will return to the octagon. However, a video released onto YouTube today suggests it may not be any time soon.
Sterling’s YouTube channel shows ‘The Funk Master’ piling weight on following his loss to O’Malley.
By the end of the video, the former bantamweight champion weighs in at 176.5lbs – some 40lbs heavier than he weighed in last weekend. In Sterling’s own words:
“Okay guys, I told myself I wasn’t gonna get that heavy, but as you can see, the process has already begun. Still got a little bit of a layer underneath there, a little bit of fat on the top. I checked my weight and I’m about 173lbs I think, but I still got some time before vacation so I might do a couple of subs, so let’s see what I weigh...”
The video is a far cry from the kind of social media posts that Sterling was making prior to his fight with O’Malley. Those posts showed him looking shredded during his training camp for the bout.
Aljamain Sterling vs. Sean O’Malley: Could ‘The Funk Master’ now move to 145lbs?
Prior to his fight with Sean O’Malley, Aljamain Sterling was bullish about his future, stating that the clash would be his last one as a bantamweight.
At that point, Sterling apparently intended to challenge Alexander Volkanovski for the featherweight title if he’d won.
After his loss, though, ‘The Funk Master’ was happy to admit that the idea of a title shot at 145lbs was basically dead in the water.
Unsurprisingly, this was later confirmed by Volkanovski himself, who stated that the fight was “not happening”.
However, based on his weight gain, a move to featherweight could still be on the cards for ‘The Funk Master’, albeit without an instant title shot.