Ben Askren Rips O’Malley for leaving on stretcher at UFC 252

Sean O’Malley suffered the first loss of his career at UFC 252 this past weekend against Marlon Vera. O’Malley did not protest what many considered a late stoppage. Instead, he laid in the octagon wincing in pain.

O’Malley suffered an ankle injury to his left foot that led to his leaving the octagon on a stretcher.

Former UFC fighter Ben Askren saw that as a sign of weakness.

“He wanted to just be out of there for whatever reason,” Askren said Monday while stepping in to co-host ESPN’s “DC & Helwani.”

When discussing the reason for the stretcher Askren was livid.

“It’s a fist fight! Deal with that sh*t!” Askren yelled. “Deal with it! It’s a fist fight!”

“I’m saying he shouldn’t have done that. It’s a fist fight,” he said. “Yes, (O’Malley) was in pain obviously. Listen, if you don’t have the expectation that you’re gonna be in pain when you get into a fist fight, you’ve got some bad expectations.”

According to ESPN, an X-ray was taken of O’Malley’s left ankle that revealed no fractures but an MRI will still be necessary to access the extend of the injury.

Despite the injury, Ben Askren still criticized O’Malley for allowing himself to be carried out on a stretcher.

“If they tried carting me out because of an ankle injury, I would’ve fought someone over that,” Askren said. “You’re not putting my ass on a stretcher because I got an ankle injury. I got one other good leg, and I’m gonna hop all the way to the back. Leave me the eff alone. I think he needs to grow up. …

“It’s part of growing up. In life, you have failures, you have struggles. You’re gonna learn from them. Obviously he hasn’t lost a fight to this point, so he probably hasn’t experienced those really hard things and really, at this point, embarrassment also.

He was building himself up and got his ass kicked by ‘Chito’ Vera. He’s probably a little embarrassed by that, as well. Hey, that’s part of it. Get up, rub some dirt on it, hop yourself to the back.”