UFC 297’s Dricus du Plessis recounts impromptu brawl with champ Sean Strickland

UFC middleweight champion Sean Strickland says a lot of stuff, running the gamut from setting guidelines for off-limits trash talk topics to violating virtually every one of said limits in profane and insensitive ways.

In one of his more off-kilter media interactions, Strickland told reporters in 2021 that he “would love nothing more than to kill somebody in the ring.”

Granting that “ring” really refers to the cage, the typical Strickland fight over the past four years — since his return from a motorcycle accident — doesn’t resemble that of a kill-or-be-killed combat sports athlete.

Dricus du Plessis, on the other hand, fits that role a whole lot more cleanly.

So when the South African middleweight, who turned 30 on Sunday, meets Strickland at UFC 297 in Toronto on Saturday (10 p.m. ET, ESPN+ pay-per-view), the champ will be squaring off against a fighter who has needed to go the distance fewer times in his career than Strickland did just last year on his way to winning the belt.

“He’s there to win; he doesn’t really care about entertainment value,” said Du Plessis during a recent video call with The Post. “I hit a lot of pads training, a lot of slams. I train a lot of submissions. When I’m thinking of hitting a pad, I’m not thinking about touching somebody. I think about knocking somebody out. … I’m always going to try and finish it.”

That’s not just empty talk, as du Plessis (20-2, 19 finishes) has ended each of his last three, all against ranked middleweights, in the second or third rounds.

After forcing Darren Till to tap to a face crank during a Fight of the Night in December 2022, du Plessis solicited a corner stoppage against Derek Brunson in March and became only the second man to (T)KO former champ Robert Whittaker at 185 pounds in July.

An equal opportunist, du Plessis has nine (T)KOs to his credit and 10 submission victories, and he has won all eight of his fights since leaving the welterweight division behind, back when he had yet to sign with the UFC.

By comparison, seven of Strickland’s 10 bouts since his two-year hiatus following the accident have gone the distance, including five of six five-round main events.

While du Plessis wouldn’t paint Strickland (28-5, 15 finishes) as a boring fighter — the champ has earned Performance of the Night bonuses three times the past four years — and allowed “he has his moments,” the challenger paints his style as more pleasing to fans.

“If you look at my fights, show me one boring fight that I’ve had in my whole career,” du Plessis said. “… It’s not gonna be a boring fight because I won’t allow it. I don’t possess the style to have a boring fight. Never have. Never will.”

Might as well throw in the first fight between du Plessis and Strickland while the score is being tallied.

That first clash won’t be found on their official record because the impromptu skirmish between the two happened just one month ago during the pay-per-view portion of UFC 296, just a few yards from the octagon.

Strickland was seated just a couple rows ahead of du Plessis at T-Mobile Arena — a decision UFC president CEO Dana White dubbed “stupid” and for which he took full responsibility — and, after an exchange of heated words, Strickland calmly ushered those seated between the two out of the way before exploding into a flurry of strikes.

To hear du Plessis speak of the leadup to the brawl, “just me being around [Strickland] made him feel insecure.”

Still, du Plessis wasn’t expecting to trigger the ensuing kerfuffle, which he classified as “unexpected” rather than a sucker punch.

“I didn’t think that was gonna happen,” said du Plessis, who arrived at his seat just before the main card started and roughly 60-90 minutes before the two came to blows. “It’s the middleweight champion of the world. A lot of times, things happen, and we act accordingly to the situation, and that’s exactly what happened.”

Fortunately, neither man took enough damage to throw off plans for the actual fight in Canada.

While noting Strickland landed “a couple of good blows, elbows to the head,” du Plessis played down their effectiveness and the power in the hands of his upcoming opponent.

“I thought maybe somebody who was not a pro fighter was busy hitting me as well.” du Plessis jabbed. “Maybe one of his friends because he didn’t feel like a world champion.”

And even if White called himself an “a–hole” for creating the situation, it’s easy to see how he’d be doing so while laughing his way to the bank.

The unexpected tiff only raised the profile of a fight that wasn’t necessarily the most anticipated championship matchup on the horizon beforehand.

Du Plessis conceded it’s fair to assume UFC 297 may benefit from a bump in pay-per-view sales as a result, but he wondered if that’s the type of attention the promotion would want for its image after decades of erasing late Sen. John McCain’s “human cockfighting” label.

“We are athletes now,” says du Plessis, noting how far the sport as come from the no-holds-barred days. “People look up to us, and we are all exceptional human beings. We are different than any other athlete in the world.

“There’s two sides. There’s the good side of the pay-per-view, but then you’re looking at, this is our middleweight champion of the world jumping over chairs to punch somebody in the crowd, even though we are going to fight now. If I wanted to press charges, I could have. He wouldn’t have been able to come to Canada and have this fight.”

Not that du Plessis would have considered getting the authorities involved.

“Me pressing charges? No, that’s not happening,” says du Plessis coolly. “That’s not the way I was brought up. That’s not the way we do it.”