Coach: Sean Strickland Open to Future Move to Boxing After Ngannou vs. Fury

Coach Eric Nicksick believes Francis Ngannou broke the proverbial four-minute mile barrier for MMA fighters with his showing against Tyson Fury on Saturday in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

Ngannou dropped the WBC heavyweight champ in Round 3 before taking him to a tightly-contested split decision. While Ngannou came up on the short side of the controversial split decision, “The Predator” was definitely the biggest winner of the night, being hailed as the new lineal heavyweight champ by fans and pundits alike.

Nicksick believes the former UFC heavyweight champ’s performance has set a new benchmark for MMA fighters looking to venture into pugilism. For Nicksick, it was the second shocking performance from one of his pupils in recent times after Sean Strickland’s massive upset win over Israel Adesanya at UFC 293 last month.

In the immediate aftermath of Ngannou’s clash on Saturday, Nicksick contacted Strickland with the proposal of a potential move to boxing, and according to him, the newly crowned UFC middleweight champ obliged.

“The first thing I wrote Sean Strickland: ‘Ready to move to boxing?’ And he’s like, ‘Damn right. That’s all I do (is) spar boxers, anyway,’” Nicksick recently told MMAjunkie Radio. “I think that Francis paved that way and showed we are capable of competing, and not only competing, winning and putting it together at a high level. I’m proud of him, he kind of laid that groundwork.”

While Ngannou’s performance might have come as a shock for the rest of the world, his coach has seen the former sand mine worker from Cameroon has overcome too much in life.

“Nothing surprises me anymore when it comes to Francis and the level of expectation he carries,” Nicksick said. “We love that – the doubt and everything that we’re told we can’t do. It does motivate us, and I know it motivates him. This is something that he’s had in his mind for such a long time now. For it to come to fruition, there’s a moment in the ring where Tyson was walking in, and I’m just taking it all in, looking at the event itself, and Francis looks over at me and just has this big-ass smile on his face. I’m like, ‘Dude, you did this.’”