Robert Whittaker is entering UFC 298 coming off of a stoppage loss to now middleweight champion Dricus du Plessis, and while he acknowledges it wasn’t his best night at the office, he took a lot away from that performance this past July at UFC 290 — including confidence that he’ll get the better of du Plessis in the future.
Whittaker, a former UFC middleweight world champion, faces Paulo Costa in the co-main event of the promotion’s next pay-per-view card Feb. 17 in Anaheim, Calif. “The Reaper” says one of the biggest issues in his loss to du Plessis was that he didn’t give credence to his opponent’s motivation and hunger once the cage door locked.
“Dricus is a hungry guy, and I think I underestimated that hunger,” Whittaker said at the UFC 298 pre-fight press conference in Sydney, Australia. “I still believe I beat him nine times out of 10, I still believe that I’m a better fighter than he is, that I have a better skill set than he does, but [fighting] a big, strong, hungry guy that’s willing to leave it all there, you need to match that. I feel like I didn’t do that in that last fight and it really made me think a little bit.”
For the first time in nearly a decade, Whittaker enters the octagon after losing two of three, which includes a title fight decision loss to Israel Adesanya at at UFC 271 in February 2022, and a lopsided decision win over Marvin Vettori at UFC Paris seven months later.
Whittaker and Costa were paired up twice before, including a year ago at UFC 284 when the promotion announced the bout, although it didn’t get finalized in time. In Whittaker’s eyes, the matchup can’t come soon enough. He’s ready to bounce back, and plans to do so in emphatic fashion.
“It is what it is, the best way to make amends is to get back on the horse, and the only way to prove everyone wrong is to get a win under your belt,” Whittaker explained.
“The du Plessis fight and camp was a good wake-up call. From that fight, from that camp, from that preparation, we went back to the gym, went back home, we saw things in hindsight — which is always 20-20 — and we took things away that we liked, added things, made some tweaks here and there, and honestly, I would think it’s been for the better. I’m coming into this fight hungrier than ever. I’ve been really focused on trying to bring that animal back.
“I’m not just in this fight to win, I’m in it to hurt Costa and I think that mentality is a powerful thing to have.”
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