UFC star Paddy Pimblett argues Jon Jones ‘should be stripped’ after title shakeup at lightweight

Paddy Pimblett was surprised when Islam Makhachev recently vacated the UFC lightweight title. Especially because Jon Jones is still the champion at heavyweight.

Makhachev is the No. 1-ranked pound-for-pound fighter in the UFC right now, thanks to a dominant reign as lightweight champion. However, he recently dropped his lightweight belt with plans to move up to welterweight in pursuit of a new title. There’s been some suggestion that the UFC pressured the Russian to relinquish his lightweight title if he intended to change divisions.

That’s all well and good, except that the UFC has been pretty inconsistent as to when fighters relinquish their titles. Jon Jones, for example, has held the “undisputed” heavyweight title since early 2023, and has only defended it once since, against a fading Stipe Miocic. All the while interim champ Tom Aspinall has been campaigning for a fight with the undisputed champ.

According to Pimblett, if the UFC pushed Makhachev to drop the lightweight title, they need to be just as heavy-handed with Jones.

“I didn’t think they should make Islam vacate,” Pimblett told TNT Sports. “If you’re making Islam vacate, Jones needs to be stripped.”

Paddy Pimblett: Islam Makhachev should have had opportunity “to be double champ”

Pimblett went on to point out that Makhachev has four defenses and that he has been “fighting people on short notice.” Makhachev won the vacant title with a submission win over Charles Oliveira in 2022. He later defended the title with a decision win over Alexander Volkanovski. He then defended it again with a knockout of the same man in a short-notice fight. His last fight was also on short-notice. He had originally been set to fight Arman Tsarukyan. Yet after a last-minute injury, shifted his focus to Renato Moicano on just hours’ notice. He won by submission.

After all of that, Pimblett believes the UFC should have let Makhachev attempt to win to titles simultaneously. The promotion has previously done so for the likes of Conor McGregor, Amanda Nunes, Henry Cejudo, and Daniel Cormier.

“You should let him try to be double-champ,” Pimblett said.