After seeing Khamzat Chimaev’s first-round destruction of Robert Whittaker, Joe Rogan thinks reigning middleweight champion Dricus Du Plessis might be in trouble.
Following a year-long layoff, ‘Borz’ returned to the Octagon with a bang at UFC 308, scoring a quickfire submission victory over ‘The Reaper’ to further establish himself as a legitimate contender in the 185-pound division.
Rogan, who was not on hand in Abu Dhabi as he no longer travels outside of the U.S. for UFC events, offered his reaction to Chimaev’s dominant showing during a recent episode of his JRE podcast.
“Khamzat just charged in, dove in, got him down, and mauled him,” Rogan said. “Mauled him until he broke his face. Khamzat just shot in on him and started beating the f*ck out of him. Robert got up once and Khamzat dove on him again and had him back down in a second so it’s demoralizing
“What he did to Whittaker, nobody thought that was going to happen. He’s terrifying. He does that to everybody. Everybody he gets ahold of, he just ragdolls and Robert Whittaker—seeing him break Whittaker’s jaw just by squeezing across his face…”
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Earlier this year, UFC CEO Dana White promised the next shot at Du Plessis to former titleholder Sean Strickland. However, Rogan thinks that the promotion needs to strike while the iron is hot and give ‘Borz’ the next crack at ‘DDP.’
“You give him the title shot,” Rogan insisted. “Holy sh*t. He gets a title shot, I think. Not just [beating Whittaker in the first round], but ran through him. He didn’t get touched. He ran through him and strangled him in the first round.
“He might be the guy…Think about this at [185 pounds]. So this guy was killing himself to get to 170. At 185, he’s the f*cking man.”
Joe Rogan Suggests Khamzat Chimaev May Be Too Good For Dricus Du Plessis to Handle
While Chimaev saw some struggles competing at 170—particularly in his fight with Gilbert Burns at UFC 273—the undefeated Chechen monster has looked practically unbeatable at middleweight.
As for how he stacks up against the dangerous and durable Du Plessis, Rogan said:
“[Du Plessis] can wrestle, he’s got very good jiu-jitsu, he hits f*cking hard, and he’s a big durable dude, but I don’t know if he’s going to be able to wrestle with [Chimaev]. Like, I don’t know man. Khamzat’s skill is so high level that it makes me wonder. You see it in jiu-jitsu, there are some guys who look really good until they fight someone who is really really good. And then they get manhandled. It’s like everybody looks good until they face Gordon Ryan.
“Is Khamzat at that level? It kind of appears that he is. In terms of the grappling that he possesses, it seems magnitudes greater than anybody else in his division.”
Did Khamzat Chimaev skip to the front of the line with his highlight-reel finish at UFC 308?
Only time will tell, but it appears as though the entire MMA community is more interested in seeing ‘Borz’ battle Du Plessis instead of watching Strickland run it back with the South African early next year.
