“No way was that intentional” - Jarred Brooks maintains he never meant to piledrive Joshua Pacio in ONE 166 world title match
It has been a good couple of months since the incident, but Jarred Brooks still suffers from the deluge of questions about his unfortunate defeat to Joshua Pacio. The rivals met on the stacked ONE 166: Qatar card in March.
Their hyped matchup quickly turned into a disaster when Brooks inadvertently spiked Pacio's head to the canvas. The move is deemed illegal under the Global Mixed Martial Arts ruleset, and Brooks subsequently relinquished the ONE strawweight MMA world title to Pacio.
In an interview with Sportskeeda MMA, Brooks said he never meant to spike Pacio head-first to the ground and what happened in their match in Qatar was an unfortunate accident.
"No way was that intentional," said Jarred Brooks. "I don't wanna lose any part of my pay. I don't wanna lose my belt, and I don't want to lose a lot of things."
Brooks and Pacio's rivalry over the ONE strawweight MMA world title is arguably the most heated feud in ONE Championship history, and their world title rematch in Qatar was seen as a turning point in their head-to-head series.
Things started well enough for Brooks in the first seconds of the fight, but a routine takedown turned into catastrophe after he accidentally drove Pacio head-first into the canvas.
Pacio, fortunately, only suffered minor injuries to his neck, but it's unclear when he'll be able to defend the strawweight MMA throne.
Jarred Brooks wants a definitive end to his rivalry with Joshua Pacio
Jarred Brooks knows his rematch against Joshua Pacio was an absolute botch, and he believes his rival deserves a world title win he should be proud of.
In an interview with The MMA Superfan, Brooks said he and Pacio should run it back the moment 'The Passion' is medically cleared for a fight.
"I also think that Josh, Josh deserves to fight me. Yeah, you know. I think that this is a huge fight. I think that everybody wants to watch that fight over any other strawweight [fight] for Joshm" said Brooks.
Watch Brooks' entire interview below: