Ilia Topuria took out his third former champion while becoming one of only a handful of fighters to ever win titles across two division when he knocked out Charles Oliveira at UFC 317.
Immediately afterwards, Topuria started listing off potential challengers including Arman Tsarukyan but ultimately settled on his longtime rivalry with Paddy Pimblett, who ended up coming into the octagon for a faceoff before a shove forced security to intervene. Judging by the disdain shared between these two fighters, Topuria’s first title defense as lightweight champion is almost assuredly going to come against Pimblett, but UFC legend Matt Brown really hopes that’s not the case.
“It’s probably going to be Paddy but it should goddamn well be Arman,” Brown said on the latest episode of The Fighter vs. The Writer. “We know that right? Of all the amazing things that Ilia has done so far, the fact that he called up Paddy, I’m not going to say he was ducking Arman, but he wanted that fight to be next. What I want to see personally, not saying this is the way everybody should feel, but I want to see him fight Arman. I think if he goes out and beats Arman, especially in a good fashion, but just beats him period, that to me is bigger than beating Charles, personally.
“I guess when you look at it that way in terms of the biggest fights but Paddy has not earned that. He just does not deserve to be there. Even other guys other than [Justin] Gaethje and Arman that deserve to be there.”
By all measures in the lightweight division, Tsarukyan is the most deserving contender, but he ended up on the UFC’s bad side after a back injury forced him out of a scheduled fight against then champion Islam Makhachev back in January. Following that debacle, UFC CEO Dana White declared that Tsarukyan needed to win another fight before he could earn a title shot but that was before Makhachev left the division and Topuria was crowned as champion.
As far as Pimblett goes, Brown concedes that the Liverpool native is going to bring more eyeballs just because he commands so much star power but beating him doesn’t do nearly as much for Topuria as a win over Tsarukyan.
In fact, Brown believes if Topuria can dispatch Tsarukyan like he’s done to Oliveira, Alexander Volkanovski and Max Holloway in his past three fights, he already deserves consideration among the all-time greats in the sport.
“Ilia to me is on the verge of we start comparing him to like Jon Jones,” Brown said. “To me, if he goes out and beats an Arman or maybe Islam [Makhachev] moves back down or [Ilia] moves up if Islam wins or [he fights Jack] Della Maddalena, we’re starting to talk about Jon Jones level greatness. Start making comparisons, but if he goes out and beats a Paddy, he’ll go back and fight some of the tougher guys after that — not that Paddy’s not tough, I shouldn’t say that — but we know he’ll go back and fight some of those tougher matchups after that at some point. I just want to see it now.
“The guy’s right on the verge. I looked through some of Jones’ resume, and I was comparing some of the three fight runs that he went on, which he went on an undefeated run, but I’m not sure you compare them to this with Ilia. Maybe hindsight is 20/20, but I don’t know it’s as good as this run that Ilia is on.”
Brown says as amazing as Jones was at the peak of his career, he eventually ran through the top competition and he ended up facing some opponents who probably didn’t deserve to be in there with him. That’s likely due to a shallower pool of talent in the light heavyweight division where Jones primarily competed.
The same can’t be said at lightweight, which has traditionally been one of the deepest, nastiest divisions in the sport. Combine that with Topuria taking out two of the greatest featherweights of all-time in his title fights at 145 pounds and he’s starting to put together a resume that even Jones can’t match.
“I want to see the run keep going,” Brown said. “That’s my biggest criticism of Jon Jones. He did eventually kind of taper off in terms of level of competition. I want to see Ilia go fight the baddest dudes and just see if he’s all that.
“If he can beat Arman next, that’s a pretty strong seal right there, especially I guess he probably won’t get the Islam fight depending on what happens with him and Della Maddalena. Outside of moving up to 170, Arman is the one that makes the most sense in terms of greatness.”
Of course, Brown understands choosing Pimblett over Tsarukyan when it comes to business, because one fight is definitely more lucrative while likely facing far less risk.
That said, Brown still argues that Topuria should face Tsarukyan next, because it’s the fight that means the most to the legacy he’s building with the potential to go down as the best ever.
“It sounds like it’s probably going to be set with [Paddy Pimblett] and it’s going to be a gigantic fight,” Brown said. “I’m going to argue to the end it should be Arman. I want to see that fight. I think if Ilia goes out and beats Arman, it certainly adds to the argument that he is the greatest ever.”
