‘I’m Getting This One Back For My Brother’ – Christian Lee Eyes Sweet Revenge Against Tye Ruotolo At The Inner Circle 37
Two-division MMA World Champion Christian “The Warrior” Lee has a title to defend and a family score to settle, and this Friday, November 6, the same man stands in the way of both.
The 28-year-old puts his lightweight gold on the line against ONE Welterweight Submission Grappling World Champion Tye Ruotolo in the main event of The Inner Circle 37.
That show streams exclusively for members at live.onefc.com from the iconic Lumpinee Stadium in Bangkok, Thailand, and Lee is more focused than ever before.
The fuse for this showdown was lit at ONE Fight Night 35 in September 2025.
That night, his younger brother, Adrian “The Phenom” Lee, welcomed Ruotolo to the all-encompassing discipline. The teenager scrambled out of trouble and made the submission grappling king work for every inch, but late in the second round, the California native took his back and sank in a rear-naked choke to force the tap.
Ruotolo gave Adrian his first loss and earned a US$50,000 performance bonus in the process. Slightly more than a year later, the older brother returns to the same stadium eager to collect a debt.
Lee told onefc.com:
“If things just went a little bit differently, Adrian could have won. With his skill set now, he would beat Tye. So, for me, I’m just happy that I get the opportunity to get in there and fight this guy because I didn’t like how that ended.
“I’m getting this one back for my brother. It’s going to be all business in there. He’s a very good grappler, but you can’t cheat the experience that he hasn’t faced yet.”
Tye certainly brings his own credentials to The Inner Circle 37 battle. The 23-year-old and his twin brother, ONE Lightweight Submission Grappling World Champion Kade Ruotolo, are a combined 6-0 in MMA, with Kade at 4-0 and Tye adding a slick first-round submission win over Shozo Isojima to stay undefeated in the all-encompassing sport.
Still, the Ruotolos are early in their MMA careers, and Lee stands in a different league. He is 18-4 with 17 finishes and owns ONE Championship’s records for most wins and most finishes. His lone victory to reach the scorecards came on 10 days’ notice in the ONE Lightweight World Grand Prix Championship Final in late 2019.
That gap is exactly where Lee intends to look.
The Hawaiian added:
“He hasn’t been in the same type of situations in MMA grappling. He’s only been in those situations in pure grappling, and I feel like it’s a different world. He has that experience in his world, but there are definitely levels to this in MMA.
“He’s never stepped in there and fought five rounds. He hasn’t been in any wars yet, and I think that his lack of experience is gonna be one of his biggest weaknesses going into this match.”
“The Warrior” has the pedigree to back his confidence. A six-time ONE MMA World Champion and fellow Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu black belt, he has fought through technical ground wars in the sport, and he knows how quickly the ring rewrites a grappler’s playbook.
That hard-earned perspective shapes the way he reads this matchup.
Lee shared:
“Everyone thinks that it’s going to be a striker versus grappler matchup in the mindset, in terms of strategy. But I believe that I’m a better MMA fighter everywhere, even in the grappling area.”
Lee’s Plan To Take Ruotolo Apart
Christian Lee has had this fight on his mind since the day it was booked. He knows exactly what a World Title bout demands, and he arrives in Bangkok with a game plan as sharp as the motivation behind it.
His younger brother’s loss gives the fight its emotional charge, but “The Warrior” is treating the matchup like a problem to be solved. Facing someone of Tye Ruotolo’s caliber, he has a clear idea of how he wants the night to unfold.
He explained:
“I’m expecting to frustrate and break his will over the course of five rounds. I don’t think that he’s gonna have it in him to last all five rounds.
“I’m going to look forward to pushing the pace, meeting his scrambles, and looking for my opportunity to finish him. So if it doesn’t happen in round one, I’ll be looking for it all the way through until round five.”
While he is happy to hunt for a late finish, his track record tells a different tale. His victories last an average of just 5:44, and 11 of his 17 finishes have come in the first round, so a quick night would surprise no one who has watched him work.
Against the ONE Welterweight Submission Grappling World Champion, though, he is staying humble. There are no bold calls for a first-round finish, only a measured read of a fight he refuses to underestimate, and the one he lands on may surprise people.
Lee concluded:
“Let’s call it … a round two finish by submission. That’s my prediction on how this matchup ends.”
