Winners and Losers of the UFC 324 and 325 Fight Announcements

This is a crucial juncture for the UFC. As 2025 gives way to 2026, the promotion will make a jump from ESPN to Paramount, marking a new chapter in its history.

From the moment the UFC's deal with Paramount was announced, the expectation was that it would load its first few cards on the network with huge fights. That turned out to be precisely the case, as company CEO Dana White recently revealed trio of huge title fights for the first two cards of the new year.

Unfortunately, his announcements have been met with quite a bit of blowback—largely because the fights he announced are not the ones fans expected.

To recap, White announced that UFC 324, set for Jan. 24 in Las Vegas, will be headlined by an interim lightweight title fight between Justin Gaethje and Paddy Pimblett, who will look to keep the division moving while undisputed champion Ilia Topuria takes some time away from the sport. The co-main event, meanwhile, will see women's bantamweight champ Kayla Harrison against consensus GOAT Amanda Nunes, who emerging from retirement for the fight. White also announced that UFC 325, set for Jan. 31 Sydney, Australia, will be topped by a featherweight title fight, with champion Alexander Volkanovski running it back with Diego Lopes.

There is no question that these are all massive and highly competitive matchups. However, they are not perfect, and actually have pretty major consequences for both other fighters and the fans.

Without further ado, let's take a look at the biggest winners and losers of White's recent UFC 324 and 325 announcements.

Winners: Paddy Pimblett and Justin Gaethje

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Things are a pretty chaotic at the top of the lightweight division right now.

It all started when long-time champion Islam Makhachev vacated the division's belt with plans to move up to welterweight, where he has since claimed a second title. With Makhachev gone, Ilia Topuria knocked out Charles Oliveira to claim the vacant belt, setting the stage for a new era in the division.

Once Topuria had assumed the throne, the big question was who he would defend his title against first. The clear frontrunners were former interim champ Justin Gaethje, streaking fan favorite Paddy Pimblett, or the extremely dangerous Arman Tsarukyan. Of those three, Tsarukyan looked like the early frontrunner, and when he submitted Dan Hooker earlier this month, his lead seemed to grow even wider.

It was right after Tsarukyan's dominant defeat of Hooker that we learned Topuria would be taking some time off. It wasn't initially clear how the UFC would proceed from there, but the expectation was that, if the promotion introduced an interim title, Tsarukyan would be part of it.

Then the Pimblett vs. Gaethje fight was announced, and thousands of jaws hit the floor.

It's not that Gaethje and Pimblett don't deserve the chance to fight for the title. Gaethje is a legend, and is riding a great win over Rafael Fiziev. Pimblett is unbeaten in the UFC, and one of the most popular fighters on the roster. They both deserve this chance. They just don't deserve it as much as Tsarukyan. At all.

They have effectively won the lottery. Why, exactly, is an enduring mystery.

Loser: Arman Tsarukyan

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As we've already covered, Arman Tsarukyan is more deserving of a lightweight title shot than either Paddy Pimblett or Justin Gaethje. Despite that, he will not be involved in the upcoming interim lightweight title fight. It's a huge blow for a fighter who has won five straight fights over quality opposition, and seems to have a pretty solid fanbase behind him. And unfortunately, being excluded from the upcoming interim title fight is just the beginning of his misfortune.

Whomever emerges victorious from Gaethje and Pimblett's fight will be the new interim champion. History shows that interim champions almost never defend their belts, and instead immediately unify their titles with their division's undisputed champions. In other words, the Gaethje vs. Pimblett winner is all but certain to fight Topuria next, probably sometime in the summer or early fall.

That means that Tsarukyan will most likely have to wait for not one but two title fights to unfold before he gets his opportunity to fight for gold. That could take almost all of 2026.

In other words, it seems he is going to have keep taking on other contenders for the time being, and he really shouldn't have to. It's unfortunate, but not surprising, as it's a well established fact that the UFC is not a meritocracy.

Winner: Kayla Harrison

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Kayla Harrison has breathed new life into the UFC bantamweight division.

At several points in history, the bantamweight division has been the best women's division in the UFC, specifically during the championship reigns of Ronda Rousey, and later, Amanda Nunes.

However, when Nunes retired in early 2023, it left the division in disarray, with a few veterans squabbling over the title, and no real stars on the roster. Then Kayla Harrison made the jump to the Professional Fighters League to the UFC. Just like that, the division had promise again.

Harrison, an Olympic gold medalist in judo, had already won multiple titles in the PFL, and seemed to have all the tools to conquer the UFC bantamweight division, if she could only make weight.

Make weight she did, and after wins over Holly Holm and Ketlen Vieira in her first two fights in the Octagon, she defeated Julianna Peña to claim the title.

It was a very exciting moment for the division, and it only got more exciting when retired legend Amanda Nunes announced she planned to return to competition to take on the new champ.

It will be the toughest fight of Harrison's career, but it definitely marks a huge win for her. Retired fighters are always making big proclamations about returning to competition, and often never do. Just look at Conor McGregor. He's been shouting from the sidelines for years and is still sitting on a yacht somewhere. Nunes, as unlikely as it once seemed, is actually doing it, and if Harrison can ruin her comeback plans, it will be the single most important accomplishment on her combat sports resume.

It is an absolutely massive opportunity for her, and a gargantuan fight for women's MMA. Which brings us to our next point...

Loser: Women's MMA

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Kayla Harrison vs. Amanda Nunes is one of the biggest fights in the history of women's MMA. Both women have a long list of incredible accomplishments in combat sports, and outside of a few hiccups, have looked more or less unbeatable in their primes. It is a huge fight, with as much historical significance as anything we saw in 2025.

So why on earth is it under Gaethje vs. Pimblett on the UFC 324 marquee? Surely, the two fights should be switched around?

Gaethje and Pimblett are both very exciting, but neither has touched an undisputed UFC title, and neither is in the GOAT conversation for their division. Meanwhile their interim title fight, as we've already discussed, will probably turn out to be little more than a No. 1 contender fight, as the winner should take on Topuria sometime next year.

There is only one reason Gaethje vs. Pimblett is getting the top spot on the marquee at UFC 324, and that is an innate disrespect for the women in the sport, both among UFC brass and the fans.

Nunes and Harrison both deserve better. Nunes in particular. She is a Hall-of-Famer, for goodness sake. Does that mean nothing?

Winner: Diego Lopes

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This is a tough one...

Diego Lopes is one of the most popular fighters in the UFC right now, and he has tons of talent to boot. That talent was on full display in his recent stoppage win over Jean Silva. He is an incredible fighter, and we are lucky to have him.

Having said that, he does not deserve a shot at legendary featherweight champion Alexander Volkanovski—at all.

The first problem is that he literally just had the opportunity. Lopes battled Volkanovski for the interim less than a year ago, losing a clear unanimous decision. As great as he looked in his subsequent win over Silva, he's still just a win removed from his loss to the champ. Normally, fighters need to win multiple fights to set up the kind of opportunity he'll get at UFC 235.

The bigger problem is that there are two other featherweight contenders who clearly deserves the opportunity more than Lopes: Movsar Evloev and Lerone Murphy, both of whom are undefeated, and yet to lose to Volkanovski.

If Evloev and Murphy didn't exist, and the featherweight division was devoid of other contenders, maybe we could justify giving Lopes another crack at Volkanovski. But that's not the world we live in. This booking makes zero sense.

Having said that, it's a clearly a huge win for Lopes, who is getting the opportunity every other fighter in his division lies awake thinking about for no real reason.

Losers: Lerone Murphy, Movsar Evloev, and Alexander Volkanovski

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As we've covered, Lerone Murphy and Movsar Evloev are both far more deserving of the next crack at Alexander Volkanovski than Diego Lopes.

Murphy boasts an impressive 17-0-1 record. Highlights of his recent record include wins over Edson Barboza, Dan Ige, Josh Emmett, and most recently, Aaron Pico, who he flattened with a spinning back elbow this summer.

Evloev has an even better record, at 19-0. He hasn't been the most active fighter, but is riding recent victories over Aljamain Sterling, Arnold Allen, Ige, and most importantly, Lopes.

It's unclear why Murphy and Evloev were both passed up by the UFC in the hunt for Volkanovski's next challenger. However, there is understandable speculation that the two fighters have somewhere worked their way into the UFC's bad graces. One way or the other, it's a terrible situation for each of them. Perhaps Murphy said it a recent social media post.

"Missing the opportunity to fight one of featherweight's GOATs is what hurts me the most," he said.

Murphy may still get the chance to fight Volkanovski, but he's right, it's definitely possible he will miss his chance. The champion is now 37 years old, which is around the time fighters in his weight class start slowing down. His retirement could be just around the corner.

That makes the Lopes matchup a tough one for Volkanovski too. At this point, his legacy as one of the best fighters ever is already set in stone. However, he would surely prefer to spend the ever shrinking remainder of his career taking on fresh challenges like Murphy and Evloev than somebody he already beat. With full respect to Lopes, this is a total waste of the champ's time—like raking all the leaves out of the lawn then dumping them all back on the grass to do it again.