Cody Stamann willing to face ‘dork’ Sean O’Malley: He’ll be irrelevant ‘before you know it’

Let’s just say Cody Stamann isn’t a fan of Sean O’Malley.

The UFC bantamweight contender earned the biggest win of his career and a spot in the official rankings when his hand was raised at UFC 222 against Bryan Caraway earlier this month in Las Vegas.

Stamann vs. Caraway was in the middle of the early preliminary card on UFC Fight Pass, while a rising bantamweight prospect, Sean O’Malley, made his second Octagon appearance on the pay-per-view card later that night. He beat Andre Soukhamthath, improving his UFC record to 2-0.

O’Malley received a lot of attention after winning on Dana White’s Tuesday Night Contender Series last summer — and after smoking marijuana with rap star Snoop Dogg as part of a post-fight celebration. He made his debut last December in the co-main event position of a TUF Finale card.

Meanwhile, Stamann has quickly gone 3-0 in the UFC, with wins over Terrion Ware, top prospect Tom Duquesnoy, and most recently, Caraway. Stamann has unarguably had the better wins, thus his ranking in the 135-pound division, but still fought way earlier on at UFC 222 than O’Malley.

Stamann wasn’t happy about that. He doesn’t think O’Malley deserves the marketing push he’s been given lately.

“I think that Sean O’Malley kid is a f-cking dork,” Stamann told BloodyElbow.com. “As soon as he fights somebody real, he’s going to be irrelevant in this sport. He’s living off the hype and he’s smoking joints with Snoop Dogg, but really, honest to god, as soon as he fights somebody in the top 15, he’s gonna get f-cked up. He’s gonna be a fly-by guy that’s in and out before you know it.

“And the fact that he was on pay-per-view and I wasn’t, I’m not mad at the UFC for it, because it’s a business decision. That guy’s got a lot of hype around him. But ultimately, if he fought me or Bryan Caraway, he would have gotten his ass absolutely whooped. Bryan Caraway’s the No. 7 guy in the world; I felt like him and I should have been on the pay-per-view card, not Sean O’Malley. Sean O’Malley’s like a dorky kid with a bunch of tattoos who likes to smoke pot that people think is cool.”

Despite the fact Stamann is ranked much higher than O’Malley, he would take the fight if ever offered in a heart beat.

“That’s an easy payday. That’s an easy payday,” he said. “One double leg and a few punches away from me beating his ass. He’s a skinny, little, dorky kid. He doesn’t even belong in there. As soon as he fights a real man in the cage, he’s gonna get exposed.”

Some fans might argue Stamann should be focused on fighters ahead of him, not unranked athletes like O’Malley. Stamann doesn’t really have his attention set on the bottom of the division, as, realistically, he is hoping to fight John Lineker next. But he also believes fighting “soft ass b-tch” O’Malley would serve as a nice payday — and an easy one, too.

He usually would want to climb the ladder at bantamweight, getting closer to the very top, but putting a pause on his title-mix aspirations to face O’Malley would be an exception for him.

“Money talks,” Stamann said of the reason he would fight O’Malley. “That’s what it’s all about. I know what it’s like to fight a hyped-up guy. I fought Tom Duquesnoy, and Tom Duquesnoy is a lot more of a legitimate opponent than Sean O’Malley. Fighting Sean O’Malley, that’d be easy money. Why wouldn’t I do it? One, I don’t have to fight a guy in the top 15 that’s a killer; two, I’m fighting a guy that everybody thinks is the baddest dude in the world. So when I go out there and beat him, everybody’s like, ‘Wow, this kid is really, really legit.’ I know what that feels like, having fought Tom Duquesnoy. It’d be a win-win for me.”

All that said, Stamann certainly doesn’t expect to square off against “Suga” next.

“I know the UFC’s not gonna give me Sean O’Malley,” he said. “It doesn’t matter what I say right now in this interview, because they know once I fight him, that hype stops. He can’t handle this type of pressure. He can’t handle a real fighter in the cage.”