Justin Gaethje and Paddy Pimblett set the bar for Fight of the Year after going to war in the UFC 324 main event but at least one top ranked lightweight contender wasn\u2019t that impressed.<\/p>\n
Arman Tsarukyan watched the fight from cageside and he knew from witnesses the performances from Gaethje and Pimblett that he would have easily defeated either one of them to become interim champion. Despite an impressive five fight win streak and sitting atop the rankings at 155 pounds, Tsarukyan has remained the odd man out of the title picture after he suffered a fight week injury back in January 2025 that prevented him from facing then champion Islam Makhachev.<\/p>\n
While he\u2019s awaiting his next assignment, Tsarukyan criticized both Gaethje and Pimblett for what unfolded in the main event on Saturday.<\/p>\n
\u201cI told everybody Justin is going to win by decision,\u201d Tsarukyan said during the UFC 324 post-fight show. \u201cI didn\u2019t understand [Paddy\u2019s] game plan. He wanted to box with Gaethje, but he couldn\u2019t wrestle him, he couldn\u2019t box him. He\u2019s just a little bit young, and he has a better chin. He\u2019s a trash can.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI mean Paddy let him do that but Paddy, he\u2019s not a top fighter. If it was me or Ilia [Topuria], Justin couldn\u2019t fight like that. If I fight with Justin? I\u2019ll choke him out in the second round.\u201d<\/p>\n
While Gaethje put on another jaw-dropping classic \u2014 and earned his 10th Fight of the Night award \u2014 Tsarukyan said the fight just proved that the now two-time interim champion isn\u2019t really at his peak any longer.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s just not in his prime anymore,\u201d Tsarukyan said about Gaethje. \u201cJustin, three or four years ago he was different. Now he\u2019s getting old and he\u2019s lost a couple of fights.\u201d<\/p>\n
More than anything, Tsarukyan believes that Gaethje let Pimblett off the hook one too many times during the fight after scoring multiple knockdowns. In Tsarukyan\u2019s mind, Gaethje should have gotten the finish but instead he kept finding ways to allow Pimblett to survive<\/p>\n
\u201c[Gaethje] has no chin,\u201d Tsarukyan said. \u201cWhen Paddy clipped him a little bit, he was [wobbling] right away. His cardio is not that good, too. Paddy got knocked out like 15 or 20 times. Justin cannot wrestle and maybe he just didn\u2019t want to finish him. I don\u2019t know why. He could maybe 10 times.<\/p>\n
\u201cMaybe his game plan was like that, to win by decision but he dropped him and he was standing and waiting, when he stood up. I don\u2019t know.\u201d<\/p>\n
By all accounts, Tsarukyan should have some place in the title picture at 155 pounds but there\u2019s no telling what\u2019s actually next for him.<\/p>\n
With Gaethje now holding onto the interim title, the expectation is that he\u2019ll move onto face Topuria in a champion versus champion fight sometime in 2026. But nothing is set in stone just yet, especially with Topuria still out of action while he deals with a very messy, public divorce that also involves custody of his children.<\/p>\n
\u201cReally I want to fight with Justin because he\u2019s [got] the interim title,\u201d Tsarukyan said. \u201cIf Ilia can fight this year, they\u2019re going to fight together but if he cannot fight in April or June, I would like to fight Gaethje.<\/p>\n
\u201c[Otherwise] I have to [wait]. What can I do? I\u2019ve got to wait and get my chance to be a champion. I got that opportunity last year but I couldn\u2019t fight. I\u2019ve got to wait and they\u2019re going to give me that title.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tsarukyan did throw out one possibility that hasn\u2019t been discussed yet and that\u2019s a fight against Gaethje with Topuria actually leaving the division. While there\u2019s no sign that\u2019s going to happen, Tsarukyan offered that prediction when addressing the future of the lightweight title.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think I\u2019ll fight with Gaethje and Topuria is going to fight for the 170 title,\u201d Tsarukyan said. \u201cI don\u2019t know. I just guess.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Justin Gaethje and Paddy Pimblett set the bar for Fight of the Year after going to war in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":432629,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[444],"tags":[49,48,641,701,638,82,640,702],"class_list":["post-432628","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mma","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-fighting","tag-latest-news","tag-mma","tag-sports","tag-ufc","tag-ufc-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/432628","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=432628"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/432628\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/432629"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=432628"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=432628"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=432628"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}