Sean Strickland vs Alex Pereira being targeted for UFC 277

Both Sean Strickland and Alex Pereira have been making some waves in the UFC’s middleweight division as of late, and it appears the two will face one another over the summer.

This bout is expected to take place at UFC 277 on July 30, 2022, at a to-be-determined venue. It’s not a done deal yet, but this is the direction the UFC is looking at.

Strickland has improved drastically over the last few years, winning his last six-straight contests, making it five-straight since moving back up to the middleweight division.

In this time, a new addition came to the roster in the form of multi-time kickboxing world champion Alex Pereira.

The Brazilian talent went 33-7 in the sport, even going 2-0 against current UFC middleweight champion Israel Adesanya in kickboxing competition, KO’ing him stiff in their rematch.

Following a return to MMA in November of 2020, which saw him victorious via KO in round one of a bout held under the LFA banner, he was signed to the UFC.

Once arriving to the world’s leading promotion, he first secured a second-round flying knee knockout in November, before defeating Bruno Silva earlier this month at UFC Vegas 50.

Pereira became the first man to defeat Silva in a striking contest; all of Silva’s previous defeats came via submission, and 19 of his 22 wins came via knockout. Oh, Silva was also on a seven-fight knockout streak coming into that contest.

Strickland is a little more basic with his striking than Pereira, but it works very well for him.

Pereira comes into this bout with a record of 5-1, while Strickland comes in at 25-3, ranked No. 4 in the division.

A win for Pereira here would be absolutely massive, and it could set up a potential third fight with the champion.

Honestly, either man that wins this fight could be challenging for the belt next.

It’d be Strickland’s seventh win in a row, should he win, and should Pereira win, he just took out a top contender that’s undefeated (20-0) at 185 lbs.

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Brady Ordway

I became a fan of combat sports when I was 12 years old. I was scrolling through the channels and landed upon Versus, where WEC was televised. Urijah Faber fought Jens Pulver for the second time that night. That's the first fight I ever saw, and I was immediately hooked. So eventually, I began covering the sport in the fourth quarter of 2018, and have since started writing about animals as well. If you'd like to see those pieces, be sure to check out learnaboutnature.com!

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