Probably, I think there's still a lot of unknowns about him for me at least.
While he's been booked against quite a few higher level opponents(Muniz, Hernandez, Imavov, Costa), his only two wins at middleweight were against Phill Hawes who's shot and a blown up Warlley Alves.
Mind you the second opponent was on short notice, I believe originally he was gonna fight Imavov on that date.
He's looked good enough so far outside of a little trouble with Hawes early with the kicks. It's a big jump, but a huge chance for him to prove himself here and Whittaker gets wobbled a lot in the later stages of his career.
I can't really make a proper assessment on how good he actually is yet, perhaps I'll have to watch some of his regional scene stuff for that. I will say I was surprised to see that he's not that big of a middleweight compared to some of the other ranked guys, doesn't really mean a ton tho.