T.J. Dillashaw says Luke Rockhold 'pieces up' UFC 312 version of Sean Strickland

T.J. Dillashaw is confident that Luke Rockhold could beat Sean Strickland.

Strickland (29-7 MMA, 16-7 UFC) lost a unanimous decision to middleweight champion Dricus Du Plessis (23-2 MMA, 9-0 UFC) earlier this month in the UFC 312 headliner at Qudos Bank Arena in Sydney. Rockhold, who’s wanted to get his hands on Strickland for a while, went off on him and accused him of quitting in the fight. Dillashaw was also rather critical of Strickland’s performance against Du Plessis and likes Rockhold’s chances of beating him after what he saw.

“The Sean we’re watching in this fight, Luke pieces him up,” Dillashaw said on the “JAXXON PODCAST.” “Sean, for whatever reason, was like gun shy. He’s a volume fighter and for whatever reason, he’s pop shotting. He’s throwing one jab at a time. He’s throwing one push kick at a time.

“He is not putting combos together. He’s not feinting. He’s not moving his f*cking head. He’s a robot. He was standing straight up, tall and throwing a jab the whole fight. I think that Sean was hopefully going to evolve coming into this fight, and I thought he looked worse than the first one.”

Rockhold and Strickland were previously booked to fight at UFC 268, but their matchup was scrapped after Rockhold withdrew due to a back injury. With Rockhold no longer in the UFC, a fight between them is highly unlikely, but that hasn’t stopped Rockhold from constantly berating him.

Rockhold is expected to run things back with Chris Weidman under the GFL banner this year. Rockhold dethroned Weidman to become UFC middleweight champion in December 2015 after battering him for a Round 4 TKO win.