“My body was not responding” – Aljamain Sterling was terrified of ‘Ninja’ Zabit Magomedsharipov’s 360 kicks
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Aljamain Sterling talks about sparring with Zabit Magomedsharipov
UFC bantamweight champion Aljamain Sterling recalls his sparring session with former UFC featherweight, Zabit Magomedsharipov, who is the biggest “What if” in UFC history. The Dagestani fighter was a favorite to become the next champion in the promotion but he then quit fighting.
Zabit Magomedsharipov fought in the UFC from 2017 to 2019. The Dagestani fighter was getting shouted to become the next champion of the 145-pound division when he had only 6 fights in the UFC octagon. He was one of the most exciting fighters the promotion had ever seen but the fighter who took a break from training due to his health condition has never been heard of since then.
Aljamain Sterling, who is one of the best bantamweight fighters in the world and is currently the champion reveals his story of sparring with Zabit. Sterling was recently on the Joe Rogan Experience podcast where he spoke about getting knocked out by Magomedsharipov in training. Sterling believes the featherweight division would have a huge problem if Zabit was still an active fighter.
Related UFC featherweight prospect Zabit Magomedsharipov quits fighting and pursues career in medicine
“I was set up for failure” Aljamain Sterling talks about training with Zabit Magomedsharipov
Aljamain says to Joe Rogan that he was put into the training room with Zabit during his preparation for the Marlon Moraes fight in 2017. “He threw a 360 spinning ninja kick and the leg wrapped around my neck. I closed my eyes,” said Sterling talking to Rogan about his experience with Magomedsharipov. “I ain’t never seen a ninja come at me like that in a room.”
“I didn’t know who the hell he was but I felt like I was set up for failure. He’s doing side kicks, he is doing jumping switch kicks and I’m like, ‘Yo, what the f**k is going on.'” Sterling is considered to be a huge bantamweight and even he reveals that Zabit was too big for his size. Zabit had a record of 18-1 in his pro-fighting career before he closed the curtain on his career.
“In the second round he does this tornado things and I open my eyes and everything was blurry,” said Sterling on what happened during his sparring session with Zabit. Aljamain goes on to say that he had to wave off the training session after fighting Zabit because he was hurt bad.
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Prateek Athanur
(2944 Articles Published)