Dricus du Plessis hit a raw nerve when he taunted UFC middleweight champion Sean Strickland about his troubled upbringing, and the title challenger has now given his reaction to the fact that just days later his rival shed tears while taking about his childhood trauma.
“Watching a grown man cry in an interview, it’s not really my watch material that I go and watch,” Du Plessis said on the ‘MMA On Point’ show. “But it is what it is. I’m glad he cried and he got it out. I hope that’s the end of that. I think we give him a lot more credit than he deserves in terms of mindset. I don’t think he thinks about anything. I think he goes out there and he fights – he fights the way Sean Strickland fights.
“He always has, and he’s an incredible fighter. I have a lot of respect for him as a fighter. I think he’s incredible. Do I think he’s a hypocrite? One hundred percent … 100 percent. Obviously, childhood trauma is something you can’t help, but if you know what it feels like to be the one on the receiving end of such trauma, don’t inflict it on others, because that’s exactly what he does. So yes, I feel bad for him and I don’t think any kid deserves that, ever.”
“If you go after other people, eventually they’re going to come after you,” Du Plessis continued. “I think he’s used to being the bully and he’s not used to being bullied, but I don’t have to hammer on that. I already won that fight. I won that press conference. I don’t want to keep on hammering on the same thing. Yes, he cried on Theo Von’s podcast. I guess it was terrible, and like I said, no kid deserves that. No kid deserves to go through that. But if you want to dish it out, you better take it.
“I have mad respect for him as a fighter, even as a person. He’s always been a straight-up guy. Even the fact that he tried to fight me in the crowd (at UFC 296), that was him being a man. What I’m saying is, if you want to dish it out, be able to take it, man – or you’re just a hypocrite. You didn’t deserve that as a kid, but as a grown man, you dish it out, you’re going to get it. That is the way the world works, unfortunately. And like I said, with this mindset going to this fight, I think he’s going to come out and fight the way Sean Strickland fights. My mindset: I don’t care about him. I care about me, what I do, what I go out there to do – and that is become the world champion.”
Du Plessis and Strickland will have a chance to settle their differences soon in the main event of UFC 297, which takes place on January 20th in Toronto, Canada.
