Paddy Pimblett has a forwarding address in mind for Ilia Topuria, and it’s 145 pounds. DAZN reported that the Liverpool fighter vowed to send Topuria back down to featherweight, a promise that, according to the outlet’s headline, came after a Justin Gaethje defeat. That headline is the full extent of the reporting available here. There’s no transcript of Pimblett’s exact words and no detail on what a booking would look like, so treat this as a callout until somebody signs something.
The timing is loaded, though, because Topuria’s name has been bouncing around all week for reasons that have nothing to do with Paddy.
Jon Jones went on the Prince St. Pizza YouTube channel and said Topuria was the first fighter he ever viewed as a genuine threat to his standing as the greatest of all time. Then Jones added the twist. “Honestly I thought that Ilia would be the first threat to being considered the greatest of all time. And then we saw what happened to him,” Jones said, with Championship Rounds and Spinnin Backfist both clipping the moment on X. Spinnin Backfist tied that last bit to Topuria’s most recent fight. When Jon Jones is publicly downgrading your GOAT case, every guy in the neighborhood smells blood, and Pimblett has never been shy about smelling blood.
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Meanwhile, at Featherweight
The division Pimblett wants to mail Topuria back to has its own business this Saturday. Alexander Volkanovski defends the featherweight title against Movsar Evloev in the UFC 333 main event in Abu Dhabi on Oct. 24, with the Petr Yan vs. Merab Dvalishvili trilogy in the co-main. Evloev is 10-0 in the UFC, and all 10 of those wins went to the scorecards, including a majority decision over Lerone Murphy in March.
Volkanovski turned 38 a few weeks before this fight, and he’s already sketching out the ending. MMA Junkie posted a clip of him laying out his idea for a “fairytale super fight ending,” a double retirement bout against Gaethje after UFC 333. So Gaethje is now a recurring character in two separate stories this week, and neither one involves him actually saying anything.
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Topuria’s shadow hangs over that division too. MMA Fighting’s Jed Meshew wrote in a UFC 333 roundtable that Volkanovski has been the best featherweight during parts of his second reign because Topuria let him be. Jose Aldo also told MMA Fighting he’d rather watch strikers like Topuria and Max Holloway than Evloev, who he said is “a guy who doesn’t sell, a guy who puts on boring fights.” Aldo, who said he’s rooting for Volkanovski on Saturday, apparently wants Evloev’s title shot sent back for a refund.
Quick Take
I love a guy who calls his shot, and threatening to send a man back to featherweight is a top-tier insult because it’s a size joke and a demotion rolled into one. The catch is that calling your shot only counts when you’re the one swinging. Right now the most damaging thing anyone has said about Topuria this week came from Jon Jones on a pizza channel, and Pimblett’s vow is a headline with no fight attached. If the UFC wants to turn that threat into a poster, I’m buying. Until then, the only confirmed date on this calendar is Saturday in Abu Dhabi, where Volkanovski tries to make featherweight a lot less appealing for anybody who gets sent back there.
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