Joshua Pacio is the current ONE Strawweight MMA Champion! However, the way he won the bout, left a lot of people underwhelmed including Pacio himself. The Philipino fighter took on the now-former champion Jarred Brooks at ONE 166: Qatar on March 1, 2024. As things were heating up, an illegal slam from Brooks ended the bout at the 56-second mark of the first round itself, and Pacio was declared the winner after the former was disqualified.
In an exclusive interview with Sportsmanor, the 28-year-old revealed exactly what went down after the bout ended. After the unfortunate slam, Joshua Pacio was visibly disoriented. As Jarred Brooks was going wild inside the cage and celebrating, the referee Herb Dean let him know that there would be a review of the sequence, and as it turned out, the move was illegal as fighters are not allowed to spike an opponent on their head.
Immediately after the ref stopped the bout, Pacio was taken to the hospital for further checkups. Fortunately, he did not suffer any severe career-threatening injury even after landing on his head. But, as he confessed to Sportsmanor, Pacio had no idea that he won the bout. The 5’5 fighter only got to know about the results during his medical examinations in the hospital.
He added, “I was unaware that I won the fight until I was in the hospital. I couldn’t really move when they took me out of the Circle and was really clueless on what was happening after the incident.”
Joshua Pacio wants the trilogy bout against Jarred Brooks the ONE 166 result
Joshua Pacio and Jarred Brooks are long-time rivals. Their first match came on December 3, 2022 at ONE 164. Heading into the bout, Pacio was the strawweight champion and he was looking for his fourth successful title defense. But, Joshua’s title reign came to an end when he ran into “The Monkey God” in his home country, Philipines. Although Pacio fought hard, Brooks was too good on the night and walked away with the title.
After that, he spent nearly 10 months away from MMA and made his return on October 7, 2023, against Mansur Malachiev. After beating Mansur via unanimous decision, Pacio earned the rematch at ONE 166. Unfortunately, it ended on an anticlimactic note, Hence, the current champion is desperate for the trilogy bout against Brooks. But, his return timeline also depends on the medical clearance.
He added, “As fighters, you want to be the best. And there’s no other fight in my mind than to have that trilogy against Jarred Brooks. He deserves it, I deserve it, and I think the public deserves that..”
“I want to as soon as possible, but I have to abide by what the doctors tell me. I want to be careful when it comes to treating injuries like this and I also want to be at my best whenever I step back to action. I’m a fighter and I always want to fight, but we also have to take things like these seriously,” said the champion.
So what do you make of it? Are you excited about the potential trilogy bout between Pacio and Brooks? Let us know in the comments below.