{"id":25825,"date":"2026-08-30T21:33:02","date_gmt":"2026-08-30T21:33:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mmaallout.com\/?p=25825"},"modified":"2026-08-30T21:33:02","modified_gmt":"2026-08-30T21:33:02","slug":"justin-gaethje-remains-sidelined-until-2027-amid-injury-update-both-of-my-hands-are-still-hurt","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mmaallout.com\/?p=25825","title":{"rendered":"Justin Gaethje remains sidelined until 2027 amid injury update: &#8220;Both of my hands are still hurt&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><br \/>\n<br \/><span class=\"exactmetrics-inline-popular-posts-label\">Trending:<\/span><span class=\"exactmetrics-inline-popular-posts-border\"\/><span class=\"exactmetrics-inline-popular-posts-border-2\"\/>Jose Aldo set for October 4th fighting return vs. former UFC title challenger<span class=\"photo-credit\">Zuffa LLC<\/span><\/p>\n<p>UFC lightweight titleholder Justin Gaethje won\u2019t be returning sooner than expected, as he still hasn\u2019t fully healed from his last outing.<\/p>\n<p>Gaethje emerged victorious over Ilia Topuria at UFC Freedom 250 to capture undisputed lightweight gold, but he didn\u2019t walk away unscathed. \u201cThe Highlight\u201d suffered injuries to both his hands, and he initially didn\u2019t see a chance he\u2019d compete again in 2026.<\/p>\n<p>In a fresh update, Gaethje told Sports Illustrated that his status remains unchanged. The lightweight champion still can\u2019t make full contact, but he\u2019s satisfied with wrapping up 2026 in terms of prizefighting (via MMAFighting).<\/p>\n<p><em>\u201cI still can\u2019t punch anything,\u201d Gaethje said. \u201cBoth of my hands are still hurt from the fight so I\u2019m just going to enjoy being the champion for the rest of the year because I fought two times already in the first six months.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>\u201cPut everything on paper, pros and cons, talk to my family and everybody that loves me to be honest with me and then I\u2019ll make a decision.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Arman Tsarukyan\u2019s team told Ariel Helwani that a win over Mauricio Ruffy at UFC 331 on Sept. 19 would guarantee \u201cBatman\u201d a title shot against Gaethje. If that\u2019s the case, then Tsarukyan would have to wait things out a bit, but he may not have an issue with that given that he\u2019s been busy outside of the UFC banner with his freestyle wrestling matches and other ventures.<\/p>\n<p>Charles Oliveira and Max Holloway are also options, and they both have finishing wins over Gaethje. Oliveira would be ahead of Holloway on the pecking order given that he defeated \u201cBlessed\u201d back in March. Gaethje has said he\u2019d like a chance to get revenge on both Oliveira and Holloway.<\/p>\n<p><strong>With Justin Gaethje out until 2027, do you think there\u2019s any chance an interim lightweight title fight is booked, or should UFC simply wait for \u201cThe Highlight\u201d to fully heal? Tell us what you think in the comments below.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-1 mt-0 os-source\">This article appeared first on BJPENN.COM<\/p>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.bjpenn.com\/mma-news\/ufc\/justin-gaethje-remains-sidelined-until-2027-amid-injury-update-both-of-my-hands-are-still-hurt\/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=justin-gaethje-remains-sidelined-until-2027-amid-injury-update-both-of-my-hands-are-still-hurt\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Trending:Jose Aldo set for October 4th fighting return vs. former UFC title challengerZuffa LLC UFC lightweight titleholder Justin Gaethje won\u2019t be returning sooner than expected, as he still hasn\u2019t fully healed from his last outing. Gaethje emerged victorious over Ilia Topuria at UFC Freedom 250 to capture undisputed lightweight gold, but he didn\u2019t walk away<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":25826,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[495,3319,2371,433,494,3534,7526,233],"class_list":["post-25825","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fighters","tag-gaethje","tag-hands","tag-hurt","tag-injury","tag-justin","tag-remains","tag-sidelined","tag-update"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmaallout.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25825","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmaallout.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmaallout.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmaallout.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmaallout.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=25825"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mmaallout.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25825\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmaallout.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/25826"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmaallout.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=25825"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmaallout.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=25825"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmaallout.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=25825"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}