Sean Strickland has no filter and isn’t afraid to tell people exactly what he thinks – no matter how politically incorrect or offensive his views may be. That was nowhere more clear than, say, the former champion’s controversial comments about Muslims or his recent comments about the conflict in the middle east.

Needless to say, Strickland isn’t the most popular fighter among fans or fellow fighters. While most choose to ignore his comments, perhaps in an attempt to not feed the troll, Khabib Nurmagomedov‘s team has responded to ‘Tarzan’ with some friendly advice.

“Only thing I wish about him [Strickland] is he stop, you know, doing certain things- the religion, countries and this and that. Just stick to the fighter, stick on the fighter, don’t talk about nothing else, just talk about the fighter. But hey that’s his business, I don’t like it, you know, I’ll never like it. But, again, you know, he’s a true warrior and we’ll just leave it at that,” Javier Mendez, Khabib and Islam Makhachev‘s coach said on his official YouTube channel.

For context, the AKA head coach wasn’t specifically talking about Strickland’s controversial comments. No, the coach was actually discussing ‘Tarzan’s UFC 312 loss to Dricus Du Plessis, and these comments were just a small aside in his analysis. As you can tell from Mendez’s comments, the coach is one of the most respectful and polite guys in the entire sport.

And while he has coached the biggest Muslim fighters in the entire world, Mendez is far too courteous to really go at Strickland or disagree with him in stronger terms. On the other hand, he did call Strickland a ‘true warrior’ for his UFC 312 performance, which may come as a surprise.

Javier Mendez reveals what went wrong for ‘warrior’ Sean Strickland at UFC 312

Sean Strickland probably went into UFC 312 with a staph infection. There was a large, red, ugly looking boil on the American’s arm, which looked a lot like a staph infection. But despite losing the fight, and losing it quite comprehensively, ‘Tarzan’ didn’t use the alleged infection as an excuse. And that is something Mendez can and does respect.

“I mean look, listen, the staph infection, you know, that’s a real thing. It does drain you, that’s a real thing. But if the mental is strong, you can override it. And Sean didn’t use that as an excuse… He’s a real warrior, you know,” the coach said.

As far as what went wrong for Strickland at UFC 312, Mendez felt that ‘Tarzan’ “fought the same fight that they fought the first time.” Strickland and Du Plessis, of course, first fought at UFC 297. That fight was incredibly close where ‘DDP’ eked through a split decision, which many justifiably felt could also have gone to the American.

But this time around, things were very different. The new, more-careful-less-wild mythical version of Du Plessis wiped the floor with ‘Tarzan’, who, as usual just stayed behind his jab and Philly Shell defense the whole fight.

“It’s like from what I saw, I saw one guy evolved at the game plan tremendously, another guy stayed to the same thing he’s always done. And, you know, I’m sorry but if the other guy’s improved and you haven’t improved very much… you’re not that hard to beat,” Mendez, one of the greatest MMA minds in the world, added. What do you think about Javier Mendez’s advice for Sean Strickland?