South Africa’s Dricus du Plessis has a long list of contenders at 185-pounds — and it looks like he can add a former light heavyweight champion to the mix.
Du Plessis underscored his status as the middleweight pacesetter in the UFC, scoring a fourth-round submission of former champion Israel Adesanya in the headliner of the organisation’s recent event in Perth, Australia. Since then, UFC boss Dana White has appeared to suggest that Sean Strickland might be the next man up, while the winner of the proposed late October matchup between Robert Whittaker and Khamzat Chimaev will also be considered as being towards the top of the queue.
But we can add one more name to that list: former UFC light heavyweight champion Jiri Prochazka, a fighter who finds himself at a crossroads having been defeated in two successive 205-pound title bouts by Alex Pereira (himself a former middleweight champion).
“If Adesanya wins, I’ll stay in the light heavyweight division, but if Du Plessis wins, I’ll follow him,” Prochazka said of his mindset ahead of the UFC 305 card, via MMA Mania .
“I’ll clear things up a bit there and take the belt. But I feel good and strong in the light heavyweight division, even though the guys there are a bit heavier. Almost all of them. So I have to say that I have no problem physically and strength-wise, or in any way, with clearing them out.
“But it would certainly be a challenge for me to go for the belt in the 185-pound division and then move up. But I’ll really let it flow and see how it unfolds.”
Czech fighter Prochazka has been defeated just three times in the past decade; twice to Pereira and once (back in 2015) to Muhammed Lawal. Since making his UFC debut in the summer of 2020, he has posted a record of 4-2 and is 30-5-1 in his overall career.
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