Check out the round-by-round scoring from the three judges at cageside that led to Dricus Du Plessis winning the middleweight title.
Dricus Du Plessis took the UFC middleweight title off Sean Strickland on Saturday night at UFC 297, but it was an extremely close fight.
In the end, judges Derek Cleary and Eric Colon awarded Du Plessis the fight with 48-47 scores. Sal D’Amato was the dissenting judge with a 47-48 Strickland decision. The scorecards were extremely similar: all three saw Strickland winning rounds 1 and 5. D’Amato also gave round 3 to “Tarzan.”
Watch the highlights from Strickland vs. Du Plessis here.
Interestingly enough, none of the three judges thought Strickland deserved to win round two, despite it being the round where he jabbed up Du Plessis’ right eye so badly the South African had massive swelling under his brow.
#UFC297 Official Scorecard: Sean Strickland vs Dricus Du Plessis
All Scorecards ??: https://t.co/Dgf6RIXYJN pic.twitter.com/RdzXOrtCV6
— UFC News (@UFCNews) January 21, 2024
There’s probably going to be controversy over this one as stats hounds will point to Strickland’s volume across the fight as proof that he should have won.
Sean Strickland outlanded Dricus Du Plessis 173 to 137 on significant strikes, and he had an edge in four of the five rounds. Rounds two, three and four were all extremely close numerically, but this seems to be a fight decided by impact of strikes not simply the count #UFC297 pic.twitter.com/TpoB76G9s5
— Richard Mann (@RichardAMann) January 21, 2024
But fights aren’t scored on volume, they’re scored on damage. That’s still subjective enough that we’re often left arguing over decisions on the regular, though. This split decision will be no different.
What do you think of the UFC 297 main event scorecards, Maniacs? Was Sean Strickland robbed, or did Dricus Du Plessis do enough to win? Let us know in the comments below!