Dricus du Plessis gives blunt take on whether Jake Paul fight ruined Mike Tyson's legacy: "I don't know how people were surprised"

Ahead of his clash with Sean Strickland, Dricus du Plessis shared his thoughts on the most controversial boxing fight that took place last month between Jake Paul and Mike Tyson.

Paul and Tyson had an age gap of 31 years, with the latter being 58 years old. Many fans were opposed to the fight, considering Tyson's age. The fight consisted of eight rounds, each lasting two minutes, in which ‘The Problem Child’ secured a comfortable unanimous decision victory.

In his appearance on Jacaranda FM, Du Plessis was asked if he saw the Paul vs. Tyson boxing match. He denied it, saying:

"No, I don't need to watch that. It's tough fighting at 60 years old. Yeah, I guess a lot of people watched it. It's just, for me personally, I can't get over the fact that I think it's rigged. I don't know for a fact that it isn't or that it is. I'm not saying factually it is, and that aside."

Later, when the host asked if the fight might have ruined Tyson's legacy, the reigning middleweight king asserted that it didn't affect Tyson's legacy.

"No, nothing can ruin Tyson's legacy. I mean, in his past, what he's done, the man is 60 years old, give him a break. I don't know how people were surprised by that. I mean, you can be as good as you want, but at the age of 60, you are not beating another professional sportsman at the age of 30."

Check out Dricus du Plessis' comments below (24:00):

Du Plessis is set to defend his title against Strickland at UFC 312 in February next year, at the Qudos Bank Arena in Sydney, Australia.

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Dricus du Plessis breaks down Sean Strickland's fighting style ahead of their rematch at UFC 312

In their first encounter at UFC 297, in a back-and-forth war, Dricus Du Plessis dethroned Sean Strickland to become the middleweight king by split decision. In a recent interview on the Main Event YouTube channel, he reflected on his fight with ‘Tarzan’ and broke down Strickland's fighting style, labeling it as "boring." Du Plessis said:

"Nothing's changed, he looked boring like every other fight, walking forward jabbing and teeping, it wasn't an exciting fight... It wasn't a bad performance, it was the most normal performance from him ever."

"In our fight, I remember there was a stage in the fight where I was walking forward, but he just kept moving away and I thought to myself, 'I'm going to stand here, maybe he gets the confidence to walk forward and we can punch it out.' and he just dropped his hands a little and said, 'cool'. He has no problem with the crowd booing his fighting style," he added.

Check out Dricus du Plessis’ comments below (5:48):