Not only does Du Plessis want to fight Chimaev next instead of Strickland, he can’t wait to go out and impose his will on the dominant Chechen fighter.
Dricus Du Plessis has not been shy about calling for his next title defense to be against Khamzat Chimaev instead of Sean Strickland. And now he’s revealing how a fight with Chimaev would go, and it sounds pretty exciting to us.
Du Plessis took the UFC middleweight title off Strickland at the start of 2024 in a closely contested split decision, and the UFC tapped “Tarzan” for a rematch after he defeated Paulo Costa in June. But that was before Khamzat Chimaev gorilla-smashed Robert Whittaker at UFC 308, leaving “The Reaper” with half the teeth he entered the Octagon with.
Now there’s a lot of hype for Chimaev to face Du Plessis next, and “Stillknocks” is one of the main forces pushing for that to happen even though he’s a major underdog in the match-up.
“The Khamzat fight is definitely the bigger challenge,” he said on a new episode of Submission Radio. “It’s something I haven’t seen before, it’s the unknown. In any fight that’s the biggest factor: how strong is this guy? How hard does this guy hit? How deep into the waters is this guy willing to go? That’s all the questions. You’re only getting answers one way, and that is in the fight.”
“Sean Strickland, I’ve seen it all … You know he’s going to end up jabbing and teeping and going backwards again, and maybe try and wrestle a bit more. I’ve been in there with him. The only thing that he had in the first two rounds of that fight was the unknown. And now I know all of it.
“The Khamzat fight, it’s a new challenge,” Du Plessis continued. “It’s a very big challenge … I think he’s an incredible athlete and I would love to fight him. I would love to share the Octagon with him. And at the end of the day, I’m there to fight the best guys in the world and show that I am the champion for a reason.”
Strickland has a reputation for grinding out five round decisions. While his fight against Du Plessis could be considered strategically interesting, we doubt anyone would call it a barnburner. Compare that, then, to how Du Plessis sees round one of a fight with Khamzat.
Dricus du Plessis shares a meme of Sean Strickland crying to his story #UFC #MMA pic.twitter.com/fZ9NIF2cz8
— Championship Rounds (@ChampRDS) November 6, 2024
“It’s going to be absolute chaos,” he said. “I don’t see him coming in with a different game plan. And me neither: I’m going out there to attack. I’m going there to kill him. I’m not going out there to defend takedowns. Am I going out there to defend? I’m going out there to attack.”
That’s easier said than done against someone like Khamzat, but it’s clear Dricus has put some serious thought into it.
“People don’t just go and defend against him, they’re forced,” he said of Chimaev’s style. “Usman was forced to defend, and he did a great job, and then he started with his offensive wrestling — showing Khamzat that he’s not the only one that can wrestle in there. I think that was a big key in that fight which made it a very close fight. And then Gilbert Burns being an absolute animal, not being scared of wrestling and going for it, attacking.”
“That’s it. This game doesn’t work by defense. You don’t win fights by defending. You win fights by attacking.”