Robert Whittaker isn’t too offended by UFC middleweight champion Sean Strickland’s criticism of his fighting style.
During last Thursday’s seasonal press conference, Strickland downplayed Dricus Du Plessis’ TKO win over Whittaker at UFC 290, calling “The Reaper” one dimensional. Du Plessis was a big underdog in his fight against former champion Whittaker, but Strickland said Whittaker only had one thing to offer offensively and failed.
“Yeah, he beat f*cking Whittaker, but guess what? I would f*cking destroy Whittaker,” Strickland said. “F*ck Whittaker. I don’t understand why that is like the biggest accomplishment. Whittaker from a fight perspective, he has one thing. He has a blitz. Dricus shut it down. He had nothing else.”
Strickland makes his first title defense against Du Plessis in the UFC 297 headliner Jan. 20 in Toronto. Whittaker disagrees with Strickland’s assessment but isn’t surprised to be on the receiving end of his insults.
“I don’t think it was smack talk to be honest. He just off commented and downplayed my abilities, and I don’t expect him to pump tires to be honest,” Whittaker said on his “MMArcade” podcast. “Yeah, I don’t think I’m as one dimensional as he says.
“I think my blitz is a strong part of my game, but I got other tricks. But honestly, it was nothing really. I’m not going to say I like him, but I don’t hate him because he’s kind of holistically against everybody. He’s not singling out certain people or genres or races or colors. He’s just kind of telling off everyone.”
Strickland and Du Plessis’ trash talk spilled over to this past Saturday’s UFC 296 event where both fighters came to blows after Strickland jumped Du Plessis. Whittaker isn’t buying the whole scenario and thinks it resembled a pro wrestling skit.
“I thought it was staged honestly, because it was weird the way it happened,” Whittaker said. “You saw it obviously, so you saw the way Strickland was like, move aside please, makes sense, but then he jumps in like WWE style, the way he was punching like fake punching. You know what, maybe it was just for entertainment and which case you can’t really give him anything for it but I don’t know, it was a bit silly. He’s a champ.”
