Legendary boxing trainer Teddy Atlas is very high on Dricus Du Plessis.

Du Plessis (20-2 MMA, 4-0 UFC) challenges middleweight champion Sean Strickland (28-5 MMA, 15-5 UFC) in Saturday’s UFC 297 main event at Scotiabank Arena in Toronto (pay-per-view, ESPN, ESPN+) .

Du Plessis emerged as No. 1 contender when he finished former champion Robert Whittaker by TKO at UFC 290 which impressed Atlas. He praised the South African for not only physically imposing his will, but for having the fight IQ to go with it.

“He is so big, he is so strong, he is so explosive, he is so devastating,” Atlas said on THE FIGHT with Teddy Atlas. “He is that monster truck that runs over the smaller ones. He is that big, he is that physical, and he imposes his physicality on you. I’ve met him. When he beat Whittaker to get to the spot that he’s in right now, it was a big upset. Everyone thought Whittaker was going to win that fight. … He didn’t just beat him, he obliterated Whittaker.

“It was really impressive. But here’s the reason why I think so much of Du Plessis: Yeah he’s big, yeah he’s George Foreman strong and all that stuff. But he’s smart. If he was just big and strong, I wouldn’t have been as impressed as I was that night against Whittaker. He didn’t just beat Whittaker only on physicality, he beat him because he mixed his size and his physicality with technique and smarts.”

For more on the card, visit MMA Junkie’s event hub for UFC 297.