Paddy Pimblett could be on the verge of a lightweight title shot following his face off at UFC 317.
‘The Baddy’ entered the cage following Saturday night’s main event where Pimblett shared a heated exchange with Ilia Topuria.
While the star is undefeated inside the Octagon, some believe that this shouldn’t be the case following Pimblett’s controversial win over Jared Gordon.
For fans that have been following the polarizing character since before he arrived in the UFC, they’ll remember that there is another victory on his record that was heavily debated.
Back in 2016, Pimblett defeated a current UFC fan favorite with many believing the scorecards were incorrect.
Paddy Pimblett admits he would’ve lost to Julian Erosa under the new scoring criteria
At Cage Warriors: Unplugged 1 in November of 2016, Paddy Pimblett put his featherweight title on the line for the first time.
The new champion, who won the belt two months prior, would face Julian Erosa who at the time, had previously fought twice in the UFC after featuring on season 22 of ‘The Ultimate Fighter’.
Pimblett and Erosa went the full five rounds before all three judges scored the fight in favor of the defending champion, which was heavily criticized at the time.
While ‘The Baddy’ was able to rack up control time, he wasn’t able to threaten his opponent on the ground while Erosa landed a lot of damage on the feet.
During his recent appearance on Eric Nicksick’s Verse Us podcast, Pimblett was asked about whether he had stayed in touch with any of his previous opponents.
The lightweight star responded by saying that not only is he a big fan of watching Erosa fight, he believes that his former foe would’ve gotten his hand raised if the judges on that night were using the current scoring criteria which prioritizes damage.
“Julian’s cool. I always say now as well, if the judging system was the way it is now, Julian would have won that fight because of the way they changed the scoring system. I gassed bad in that fight. First three rounds I just wrestle f—– him, you know what I mean?
“I came out trying to strike and he caught me with better shots. He dropped me at one point and I just grabbed his legs where now, with the new judging system, where he dropped me, he probably would’ve won the round because of the damage but they hadn’t been changed yet luckily enough for me.”
Paddy Pimblett shuts down rumors that he’s fighting Justin Gaethje at UFC 319
UFC middleweight champion Dricus du Plessis got fans talking when he claimed that Paddy Pimblett would be fighting Justin Gaethje in the co-main event of UFC 319.
The news came as a surprise to many, with ‘The Baddy’ seemingly already lined up to be the next lightweight title challenger.
In a post on X, Pimblett denied that he’s booked to compete at UFC 319, making reference to the idea of him fighting a top contender like Gaethje when his grudge match with Ilia Topuria is already on the horizon.
Pimblett said during his podcast appearance that he’s happy to fight Topuria whenever the UFC wants, but his original preference was Abu Dhabi in October.