Mike Perry Sparred Sean Strickland Before BKFC 82 Return
Mike Perry’s 2025 sparring session with former UFC middleweight champion Sean Strickland drew attention online, but Perry described it as a training visit he arranged himself. The five-minute round at Xtreme Couture in Las Vegas gave Perry a look at Strickland’s defensive style while he waited for his next bout. Perry later returned to BKFC and stopped Jeremy Stephens at BKFC 82.
How Perry and Strickland ended up sparring
In an interview with MMA Fighting in June 2025, Perry said he had contacted Strickland and traveled to Las Vegas to train at Xtreme Couture. He warmed up, did a round with another partner and then sparred for five minutes with Strickland. Perry said Strickland was larger and defensive, and that he had to use pressure to get close enough to work.
The session was not a booked fight or a rivalry announcement. Perry was also promoting Dirty Boxing 2 at the time, while explaining that he had not yet received a new BKFC assignment after a lengthy layoff. He said he was frustrated to be waiting, but there was no confirmed opponent or date in that interview.
Perry’s BKFC return was later booked
In August 2025, BKFC announced that Perry would face former UFC fighter Jeremy Stephens in the main event of BKFC 82. The bout took place on October 4 at Prudential Center in Newark, New Jersey, and was scheduled for the King of Violence title. It marked Perry’s return to bare-knuckle competition after his April 2024 win over Thiago Alves and his later boxing loss to Jake Paul.
Perry defeated Stephens by fifth-round technical knockout at 1:35, extending his BKFC winning run and retaining the promotion’s King of Violence title. That result gives the earlier Strickland session useful context: it was part of Perry’s training period before a specific BKFC comeback, not evidence that an unnamed UFC opponent was preparing to fight him.
What the sparring session showed
Perry praised Strickland’s defensive awareness and said the round tested his ability to create openings against a bigger partner. Sparring footage can show a brief exchange, but it does not provide a reliable forecast of a scheduled bout, and Perry’s comments should be read as his account of a single training session.
The verified story is straightforward: Perry sought out Strickland for a round of sparring, shared his impressions afterward, then returned to BKFC months later against Stephens. Keeping those events in order avoids presenting speculation as a confirmed fight announcement while still capturing why the training clip attracted attention.
