Alexandre Pantoja’s team expects him to rematch Joshua Van for the UFC flyweight championship if he’s medically cleared to return sooner rather than later.
At UFC 323 this past Saturday, Pantoja lost the
125-pound title to Joshua Van after suffering a gruesome injury less than 30 seconds into the evening’s co-main event bout. The UFC broadcast team and UFC CEO Dana White were initially told by medical staff that Pantoja had injured his shoulder, but Pantoja’s American Top Team coach Marcos Parrumpa confirmed it’s the fighters’ elbow that is injured.
“There’s nothing wrong with the shoulder, it was the elbow,” Parrumpa said. “We have to give maximum priority to Pantoja’s recovery. It doesn’t matter what’s going to be done from here on out. The main thing is to get Pantoja’s arm healed. If surgery is needed, he’ll have surgery. If he doesn’t need surgery and only needs physical therapy, then that’s what we’ll do. We went to the doctor today and got good news, nothing is broken. So we’re going to wait through the next couple of weeks to see what’s really going to happen. It’s still too early to see how long he’ll be out.”
White indicated at the post-fight press conference that Pantoja would likely need a long time to recover and aimed at a potential Van title defense against UFC 323 winner Tatsuro Taira. However, according to Parrumpa, they’ve had conversations with the UFC brass about waiting for a final word from doctors before making a decision.
“They want to do an immediate rematch, but everything will depend on how long Pantoja will be sidelined,” Parrumpa said. “If it’s a reasonable amount of time, we’ll go for the immediate rematch. If it’s longer, the division really can’t stay stalled. We understand that. But what we want is, no matter how long Pantoja is out, we want him to come back already fighting for the belt. That’s fair for a dominant champion like Pantoja, not only because of the number of title defenses which, until Saturday, was the most among all current champions, four defenses, but also because he’s beaten most of the top 15 in the division, basically. I think he deserves to return straight into a title fight, whether it’s against Joshua Van or anyone else.”
Pantoja was looking for his fifth consecutive title defense in the UFC after claiming the title from Brandon Moreno and beating Brandon Royval, Steve Erceg, Kai Asakura and Kai Kara-France. The injury loss to Van was only his fourth defeat in 18 octagon appearances since 2017.
“Dana White seems to have the impression that Pantoja will be out for a long time, eight, nine months, maybe a year, and he said that at the press conference without even knowing it was the elbow,” Parrumpa added. “Like I said, it’s all still very early. We spoke with both Hunter [Campbell] and Mick [Maynard], and if the recovery time is reasonable, that’s what will happen, the immediate rematch, because it’s the correct thing to do. It’s Pantoja’s right.”
