What Justin Gaethje Said to Paddy Pimblett After Fight

Justin Gaethje and Paddy Pimblett stole the show in Las Vegas, Nevada, on Saturday night at UFC 324, with the main event fight for the interim lightweight championship being an absolute brawl.

Five rounds of pure action, both fighters left everything they had in the Octagon, with Gaethje eventually having his hand raised in victory thanks to the judges’ scorecards. The American secured the win via unanimous decision, which could set him up for a unification title fight with Ilia Topuria somewhere down the line.

Gaethje bloodied and battered his British opponent, sending him to the canvas on numerous occasions as well, but as Pimblett once famously said, ‘Scousers don’t get knocked out’, and boy he didn’t, despite it looking likely in near enough every single round.

It must be said, there was some eye-poking controversy, with Gaethje catching Pimblett a couple of times in the eye with his fingers, but all in all, it was a well-spirited, brutal affair.

What Justin Gaethje Said to Paddy Pimblett After Fight

Once the fight was over, the two lightweights shared an embrace, clearly earning a lot of respect from one another, and during the post-fight press conference, Gaethje revealed exactly what he said to Pimblett while they were chatting inside the cage.

Due to the comments Pimblett made pre-fight towards Gaethje and the fight in general, the American admitted he was desperate to finish him, but also revealed he enjoyed teaching him a lesson.

He also reminded the Liverpudlian of what he said the pair would look like after the fight, which led to his five-word remark to Pimblett inside the Octagon.

“I really wanted to finish him, but I loved teaching him a lesson,” Gaethje said.

Gaethje then continued by saying his younger opponent simply had to learn from the defeat and accept that sometimes you will lose fights in a sport where literally anything can happen.

“He’s going to learn from this. You cannot have that mentality when you come in here. He needs to accept the worst possible outcome, and that’s how you perform the best when the pressure’s the highest. I learned that early, and it’s such a crazy sport. Anything can happen any moment. You’ve just gotta bet on yourself, and tonight I bet on me — not literally, but figuratively. It’s just what we’re doing.”

Justin Gaethje Critical of Paddy Pimblett’s Pre-Fight Mindset

Gaethje didn’t stop there, however, with his advice for the Brit, as he continued to question his pre-fight mindset and some of the stuff he was saying heading into the fight.

“You have to learn from these lessons,” he continued. “His mindset going into that fight was not good. You cannot do that like this. False confidence is terrible. It will kill you every time, and that’s what he had. Specifically saying this was going to be the same exact fight as [Michael] Chandler was crazy. I was like, ‘Yes. Thank God he’s thinking like this.’

“You cannot approach this sport like that. He’ll learn. He’s really good, he’s got balls of steel, can’t get put to sleep, obviously. I smoked him.”