Sean O’Malley could soon go to featherweight, according to his coach, Tim Welch.
O’Malley is set to rematch Merab Dvalishvili for the bantamweight title on June 7 at UFC 316. It’s an intriguing matchup as O’Malley looks to reclaim the bantamweight title he lost to Dvalishvili back in September.
Since the loss, Sean O’Malley has been in training camp and focusing on Merab Dvalishvili. Although the focus is on Dvalishvili, Welch says a move to featherweight is possible in the future, but won’t happen anytime soon.
“It’s definitely possible. There’s still really big fights at bantamweight,” Welch said to Ariel Helwani. “Sean’s 5’11. He walks around at around 160 pounds. If we took 6-7 months to put 3, 4, 5 pounds of muscle on him, he definitely could hang with a lot of the 145ers… Down the line, I think there are a bunch of really big fights for him at 145 and these weight cuts really are brutal.”
Tim Welch says every weight cut is tough, which could entice Sean O’Malley could be a featherweight in the future. But the focus is on Merab Dvalishvili and then getting other big fights at bantamweight.