Nearly five years to the day will have passed since his last fight when Conor McGregor returns to the Octagon to rematch Max Holloway on July 11 at UFC 329 in Las Vegas. If McGregor had it his way, though, he would’ve been back much sooner.
McGregor, 37, suffered a gruesome leg break in his most recent bout at UFC 264 in 2021. The second straight loss to rival Dustin Poirier put the Irishman on a long road of recovery, but he expected and planned to fight sooner, lining up a clash with Michael Chandler for June 2024 until a broken pinky toe forced McGregor to withdraw.
Ultimately, the question of why McGregor has been out for so long is one for the UFC rather than him, the former two-division champion said in-studio Tuesday on “The Ariel Helwani Show.” Now, he has two fights left on his UFC contract, and he happens to know the timeline for both.
“I have both dates for my fights,” McGregor told Uncrowned. “I have July 11. When would you think they would put me back in [after that]? … April 2027. It’s almost a year later. That’s ridiculous to me, I think, no? This is the way the contract was done.
“You’d have to ask [my manager] Audie [Autar] on all of that. I’m like, ‘Huh?’ Just give me the f***ing contract. It gets to that stage. So I have July 11, it’s only around the corner. That’s positivity, happiness, don’t want to go too much into all that. I’ve got the fight, I’ve got the date, I feel great. Bring it on, baby. The Mac is back, and I’m putting on a show here in this fight. This is a martial arts delight, this bout. This is a fan-favorite, iconic bout. And who’s at the helm? None other than the Mac, as usual. So I’m ecstatic with that.”
McGregor said Tuesday that UFC surprisingly didn’t try to extend his contract ahead of negotiations for his return bout against Holloway. The biggest superstar in MMA’s history was ultimately happy with the agreed upon deal, but declined to share specific numbers. He also expressed a desire to do more with the company once his deal is completed.
“I’m happy to an extent,” McGregor said. “There’s a lot more there. I hope it’s with the UFC. I hope we come to something. I hope I get honored even more. I hope I’m to prove even more so what I’m about [in these next two fights].
“It wasn’t that difficult [of a deal to negotiate]. We met in the middle. We got a good, juicy one. Was it what my worth is? Probably not. Was it what they’d [initially] offered or what they’d want to offer? Definitely not. We met in the middle. I’m a fair operator, and I like to think I am so; that’s how I operate. I love the Ultimate Fighting Championship, and I’d love to continue. Let’s see how it goes.”
As most throughout the combat sports community were this past weekend, McGregor was glued to UFC Freedom 250 at the White House.
The all-American showcase displayed exactly what the promotion is capable of at its creative peak, creating a massive spectacle similar to UFC 306 at the Las Vegas Sphere. But McGregor, much to his chagrin, has been absent from such big events.
Theoretically, McGregor’s presence isn’t needed for these shows, as he’s a big enough star in his own right to attract attention regardless of a one-off gimmick. He’d ideally love to get such experiences though, he said. And from an overall spectacle perspective, he believes this type of pageantry should — and can — happen at a much higher frequency.
“You need to build up the stars, right? You have to build these guys up. There was a great opportunity to do so [at UFC Freedom 250], and I didn’t feel it was,” McGregor said.
“What’s the highest performing entity for [UFC’s parent company] TKO? It’s the Ultimate Fighting Championship, isn’t it? Isn’t it the most profitable for them, or is it the WWE? It’s pretty close. So I feel you should know where your bread is buttered. I don’t even think I was invited out there. Maybe I was invited, I could have went, but Holloway, he could have brought loads, he could have brought people out there. They should have platformed our athletes more. And that is probably why there’s a bit of lackluster feelings sometimes.
“I get to miss out on fighting in The Sphere?” McGregor continued. “I want to fight in The Sphere. I want to see the big screen behind me, you know? I want to f***ing do a stadium something. But it is what it is. We’re two fights left. Maybe we either don’t figure it out — I hope we do — or maybe we figure it out and do extraordinary events going forward.
“They should break the bank a little bit. I mean, how much they got — $1.1 billion? What was it in cash that they had after last year’s take — $1.4 billion or something? In cash profit? There should be live music at every f***ing show. There should be a full f***ing spectacle every show. Break the bank on it. That’s where the bread is buttered. So [UFC Freedom 250] showed what it can be. You want Super Bowl numbers every week, not just once every f***ing three years. We want them every week, right? Don’t we? That’s what I would be [pushing for] if I was in there pushing for [them], so there you go.”
As it stands, McGregor (22-6) returns to the MMA fold at a wildly compelling time. Aside from the UFC putting on an event as it did at the White House, Jake Paul’s Most Valuable Promotions (MVP) brought the sport to Netflix in May, and former Strikeforce and Bellator headman Scott Coker is also set to kickstart a new $60 million MMA promotion in 2027.
Options may still be scarce in the broader sense of the landscape, but there are great possibilities for the sport’s biggest stars, such as McGregor. With his contract’s impending expiration, “The Notorious” admits he has his eyes on the free agency market.
“I’m going to [test free agency],” McGregor said. “If it is an unbelievable [UFC] deal, [then it’ll be] signed, for sure. I know you want me free. You want me out here. I’m the highest paid [fighter]. I don’t want to get into this finance, but I’m the highest paid times f***ing — probably four times the highest paid. Times four, maybe, probably even five.
“I know Turki [Alalshikh] is spending, propping these guys up. Let’s see. I’m a UFC fighter, contracted to the Ultimate Fighting Championship, with an amazing event in the White House. And now we have the Mac back. I’m happy to be back. Let’s go to work.”
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