Du Plessis came to MMA through a layered combat background. He started judo in 1999, added wrestling in 2006, and turned to K-1 kickboxing in 2009, winning the WAKO Junior K-1 world title in 2012, per CONAN Daily. He studied agricultural economics at the University of Pretoria before dropping out in his final year to chase the EFC middleweight title. His pro MMA debut came on July 25, 2013, at EFC Africa 21. He spent roughly five years in Africa’s EFC, then passed through Poland’s KSW, before signing with the UFC and debuting on the UFC 264 undercard with a knockout of Trevin Giles.
In the cage, Du Plessis is awkward by design. He throws from odd angles, chains heavy clinch work to scrambles, and finds finishes from positions other middleweights treat as transitions. His significant-strike accuracy sits at 51%, with 5.18 landed per minute, and he mixes 51% takedown accuracy into striking exchanges. Durability and pace are what set his ceiling. Cardio and a willingness to eat shots to land his own carried him through three straight five-rounders. The Chimaev fight, where he was controlled on the ground across five rounds, exposed his takedown defense as the clearest hole in his game.
The defining run is short and dense. At UFC 282 he submitted Darren Till in the third round. At UFC 285 he stopped Derek Brunson by TKO in round two. UFC 290 was the breakthrough: a second-round finish of Robert Whittaker in a number-one contender bout. He took the title from Sean Strickland by split decision at UFC 297 on January 20, 2024, then submitted Israel Adesanya in the fourth round at UFC 305 in August 2024, then beat Strickland again by unanimous decision in the February 2025 rematch at UFC 312. Four wins over former UFC champions inside the title picture.
Du Plessis enters his next camp as a former champion, not a contender by ranking alone. In a statement on Instagram after UFC 319, relayed by Sherdog, he offered no excuses, credited Chimaev, and pledged a “return to glory”. The question is whether he can rebuild the grappling layer Chimaev shredded without losing the chaos that made him champion in the first place.