Sean Strickland fully acknowledges that he’s probably going to rub some people the wrong way and you can definitely add musician Machine Gun Kelly to that list.
Back in February, the former UFC middleweight champion met the rapper and rock star, whose real name is Colson Baker, at a Power Slap event when they were introduced by mutual friend and Monster Energy ambassador, Luke “The Dingo” Trembath. The encounter almost immediately turned volatile with Strickland later claiming that he “almost hit a vampire,” while calling the Cleveland native a “goth South Park character.”
The incident didn’t sit well with UFC CEO Dana White, who later said that the altercation wasn’t Kelly’s fault but rather “you can’t bring Sean Strickland around any other human beings.”
While Strickland has addressed the incident numerous times, Kelly finally gave his side of the story about the run-in with the former UFC champion when appearing on Logan Paul’s Impaulsive podcast.
“I don’t know this guy from a crumb of bread, right?” Kelly said. “I didn’t know who he was when I met him. I got hip afterwards that he’s like insanely racist and homophobic and just not my type of guy. So I would have never even wanted to shake hands with him in the first place.
“But he is also just a representative of every person who’s too scared to just be themselves. Because if you’re comfortable as yourself, you don’t care who anybody else is and how they are.”
Prior to Kelly’s comments, Strickland gave his latest version of the encounter while speaking to Xtreme Couture head coach Eric Nicksick on his podcast, Verse Us.
“He’s wearing like a f*cking vampire trenchcoat, has a f*cking purse, painted nails and ‘Dingo,’ you know me, dude. Why would you do this?” Strickland said. “Why would you set me up? I just look at him, like my brain I’m trying to process. I’m looking into the void and I think I just said ‘what the f*ck?’ Are you a f*cking gay vampire?
“Then the way he looked at me, it wasn’t funny. Like if you would have said something funny like ‘oh yeah, you look like a white trash hillbilly,’ I would have been like [yeah], I drive a Tesla, that’s gay. He looked at me with such f*cking disgust, there’s this little voice in my head said ‘we’re fighting.’ Then my girl got involved and broke us up.”
There was no physical altercation but clearly Strickland still harbors ill will towards Kelly after the incident went viral.
For his part, the 34-year-old musician isn’t losing any sleep over the incident but he did offer Strickland some friendly advice about how to handle himself moving forward.
“He’s so dumb that I’m going to tell him right now you should not keep saying stuff because it just makes me look better but you’re going to keep saying stuff,” Kelly said to Strickland. “So I know that you’ll react and say more things but you just shouldn’t as a person who’s just giving you big bro advice.
“Learn this — shut the f*ck up and don’t speak on me anymore and live your life. But you won’t and I’m going to continue laughing at you because you’re a f*cking idiot.”
Of course it didn’t take Strickland long to respond just like Kelly expected would happen.
“Getting lectured by a guy who drinks blood and wears a purse,” Strickland wrote. “Dawg you had a mid life crisis and tattooed your entire body. The “the x community of intolerance.” Ya’ll I’d hang out with you toxic trolls any day over this c*nt. Go back to cutting yourself you f*cking weirdo.”
Getting lectured by a guy who drinks blood and wears a purse.. Dawg you had a mid life crisis and tattooed your entire body. The "the x community of intolerance" yall I'd hang out with you toxic trolls any day over this cunt... Go back to cutting yourself you fucking weirdo https://t.co/4CY2L7gypT
— Sean Strickland (@SStricklandMMA) August 27, 2024