Aljamain Sterling has a lot on his plate. He’s a little over a month removed from a grueling five-round title fight against Henry Cejudo and is promptly turning around to defend his belt against Sean O’Malley in mid-August.
There’s nothing stopping Aljamain from laying around, licking his wounds, and directing all his focus towards O’Malley, but that’s just not how he’s wired. On top of his own training camp, he’s helping teammate Dennis Buzukja prepare for his upcoming bout at CFFC 120.
Sterling takes overwhelming pride in not just being a great fighter, but a great teammate, and is doing everything in his power to help Buzukja make his way into the UFC. Now an Octagon veteran of nearly a decade, Aljamain recognizes talent when he sees it, and he recognizes that in Buzukja, as well as his other Serra-Longo teammates.
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“Getting in the work with those guys is always a blessing and it just reminds me of where I came from and how far I’ve gone,” Sterling said. “I guess I’m kind of looking at it as paying it forward. Even though they might not have the biggest names, these guys are dangerous.”
For Buzukja, his ongoing journey to the UFC has had its ups and downs, and Sterling has been by his side through it all, including a win on last summer’s Contender Series that did not return a contract.
“I think Dennis did enough to get the contract,” Sterling said. “He fought a guy who’s literally just trying to push him against the cage. He did everything he could, but it’s really hard to knock a guy out who’s only trying to not get knocked out.”
To those who have followed Dennis throughout his young career, his stylistic evolution is apparent. He’s transitioned from a fighter who was heavily reliant on powerful hands, to initiating grappling exchanges and securing a ground-and-pound finish in his last fight on UAE Warriors.
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When your main training partners are Aljamain Sterling and Merab Dvalishvili, two of the best wrestlers on the UFC roster, an improvement of the grappling game is seemingly inevitable.
“I think his ground game is pretty tight these days; it’s a lot harder for even me to get a submission on the kid,” Sterling said. “I think he’s doing a lot of good, honest work and has grown tremendously in those fields. I think that’s what makes him special.”
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When he was an up-and-coming fighter, Sterling felt somewhat devoid of a true mentor in the MMA game. He points to a relationship with current UFC heavyweight champion Jon Jones, but there were still several aspects of professional fighting that Aljamain had to navigate on his own.
“Occasionally, I would be able to get Jon on the phone for like 15-20 minutes, just for a little bit of guidance as an amateur,” Sterling said. “But when it came to things like trying to make the right decisions, between management and picking the right type of fights, I never quite had that.”
Having gone through that experience himself, Sterling now makes sure no young fighters in the Serra-Longo world feel devoid of a mentor. And with 18 UFC fights under his belt, including four title fights, and soon to be two pay-per-view main events, “Funk Master” has accumulated plenty of advice to share.
“If I can help give them some of that knowledge, and it can make things easier or smoother for them to get to where I’m at, I feel like that’s a big win,” Sterling said.
For fighters knocking on the door of the UFC like Buzukja, Aljamain knows exactly how they should be conducting themselves, especially considering his call to the UFC was slightly unconventional.
“I always tell Dennis to just stay ready. That was the main thing that I learned to do. I got the call when I was drinking a beer,” Sterling laughed.
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“It was about four-and-a-half weeks out; I went for a jog that night to jump start the weight cut. It’s a little different for everybody, I think the similarities are that we’re constantly in the gym. I think that helps us succeed a lot more than others because they take off time, and it’s almost like seasonal for them, but, for us, it’s a lifestyle.”
With such a strong veteran presence in the gym, the next crop of Long Island studs is in good hands.
