{"id":346303,"date":"2025-12-15T07:42:10","date_gmt":"2025-12-15T07:42:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/346303\/"},"modified":"2025-12-15T07:42:10","modified_gmt":"2025-12-15T07:42:10","slug":"ilia-topuria-claims-lightweight-plans-will-change-if-justin-gaethje-wins-at-ufc-324","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/346303\/","title":{"rendered":"Ilia Topuria claims lightweight plans will change if Justin Gaethje wins at UFC 324"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Ilia Topuria has made quite the assertion about what a win for Justin Gaethje at UFC 324 would do.<\/p>\n<p>Gaethje is an underdog going into his interim UFC Lightweight Championship fight against Paddy Pimblett, which is scheduled for Jan. 24. The fight will headline UFC\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bjpenn.com\/mma-news\/ufc-324\/ufc-324-gaethje-vs-pimblett-fight-card-and-rumors\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">debut event on Paramount+<\/a>. It\u2019s a new era for UFC, as the top MMA promotion ditches pay-per-view.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe Highlight\u201d has said he plans to disrupt UFC\u2019s plans to ultimately book Topuria vs. Pimblett. Speaking to MMA journalist <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/CCLegaspi\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Carlos Contreras Legaspi<\/a>, Topuria made a big claim about a possible Gaethje win changing things.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Ilia Topuria says the UFC has different plans for Justin Gaethje if he beats Paddy Pimblett at <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/UFC324?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">#UFC324<\/a> \ud83e\udd14<\/p>\n<p>\u201cReally, if Justin wins, the UFC has different plans that I can\u2019t talk about at this moment.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>(via <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/CCLegaspi?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">@CCLegaspi<\/a>) <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/WQhIL9KDVl\" rel=\"nofollow\">pic.twitter.com\/WQhIL9KDVl<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Championship Rounds (@ChampRDS) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/ChampRDS\/status\/2000251412413063392?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">December 14, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe truth is I always accept God\u2019s will,\u201d Topuria said. \u201cWhatever he wants to happen to me will be good if Paddy wins. Really, if Justin wins, the UFC has different plans that I can\u2019t talk about at the moment. But if I were offered to fight Justin at the White House, it would also be very exciting for me.\u00a0 It would be something I would be very excited about.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Topuria then admitted he feels Gaethje has an uphill battle ahead of him.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI don\u2019t know how capable he would be of ruining UFC\u2019s plans and Paddy Pimblett\u2019s plans,\u201d Topuria said. \u201cIt\u2019s going to be quite difficult. Not impossible, so I wish him all the luck, but I don\u2019t know if he will be so lucky.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Back in June, \u201cEl Matador\u201d captured the UFC Lightweight Championship by knocking out Charles Oliveira. He isn\u2019t expected to return to action for a while, as he is <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bjpenn.com\/mma-news\/ilia-topuria\/ufc-champion-ilia-topuria-reveals-upcoming-hiatus-from-active-competition\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">on hiatus due to personal matters<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Topuria has had beef with Pimblett over the years, and it\u2019s no secret that a fight between the two would be quite lucrative. Many agree that if Gaethje pulls off the win over \u201cThe Baddy,\u201d he\u2019d be a live underdog against Topuria, but time will tell what ultimately transpires.<\/p>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ilia Topuria has made quite the assertion about what a win for Justin Gaethje at UFC 324 would&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":346304,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[444],"tags":[49,48,641,638,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-346303","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mma","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-fighting","11":"tag-mma","12":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/346303","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=346303"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/346303\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/346304"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=346303"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=346303"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=346303"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}