Topuria absorbed so much damage that his coaches threw in the towel<\/a> and stopped the fight after the fourth round. After Topuria made such a bold prediction, and then lost in dramatic fashion, Gaethje can\u2019t help but wonder what\u2019s next for Topuria in his career.<\/p>\n\u201cI am such a huge fan of this kid but where do you go from here?\u201d Gaethje said on the UFC White House post-fight show. \u201cIt\u2019s going to be a very tough climb back. I\u2019ve never had the mindset he had. I never thought of myself as unbeatable or infallible. I said it from day one, I\u2019m going to get knocked out with the way I fight, with how crazy this sport is.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t want to say anything bad about this guy. He was a world champion and I seized my opportunity to take it from him. But he is in the hospital right now and I\u2019m not.\u201d<\/p>\n
Gaethje recognized right away that Topuria was in for a rough night after he blasted the now-former lightweight champion with an uppercut during an early exchange that opened a cut around his eye.<\/p>\n
With blood trickling down Topuria\u2019s face, Gaethje noticed he was constantly paying attention to the cut and that let him know this was something his opponent had never experienced before.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s such a pretty boy that he was so concerned about the blood immediately,\u201d Gaethje said. \u201cI hit him with the uppercut, he\u2019s bleeding and he started touching it over and over and over.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s so f*cking dangerous. I don\u2019t know how I stayed away from some of those shots. He definitely rocked me, but I just kept telling myself to trust my abilities, not be emotional.\u201d<\/p>\n
After surviving a late submission attempt in the second round, Gaethje saw a dramatic switch in Topuria in the third round and that\u2019s when he took over the fight.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat I felt was in the third round, I kept jabbing the shit out of him,\u201d Gaethje said. \u201cThe plan was do not lead with jabs until he finds his back foot.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs soon as he finds his back foot, he\u2019s not going to be as explosive. He\u2019s not going to be as dangerous. He\u2019s not dangerous off his back foot.\u201d<\/p>\n
In the end, Gaethje dished out so much punishment that Topuria couldn\u2019t continue and his coaches didn\u2019t want to see him absorb any further harm after a brutal ending to the fourth round.<\/p>\n
While Topuria was undefeated prior to Sunday night and ranked as the No. 2 pound-for-pound fighter in the sport. Gaethje doesn\u2019t expect to see him again any time soon.<\/p>\n
In some instances champions are granted an immediate rematch after a loss but Gaethje sees no need for that. Of course, Gaethje is still contemplating his own future after finally achieving his dream by becoming an undisputed UFC champion, but he doesn\u2019t expect to face Topuria again no matter what.<\/p>\n
\u201cI would say definitely not a rematch,\u201d Gaethje said about Topuria. \u201cI made him quit on the stool. I think it was three to one. I won three rounds to one. In any election, that\u2019s a domination.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Justin Gaethje knew he was going to have to walk through hell to become undisputed champion at UFC…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":738340,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[43,701,44,41,39,42,40,640,702],"class_list":["post-738339","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-latest-news","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-ufc","tag-ufc-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/738339","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=738339"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/738339\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/738340"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=738339"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=738339"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=738339"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}