UFC lightweight champion Conor McGregor and interim champ Tony Ferguson are out of action and has created a logjam in the division’s title picture. Mcgregor’s return to UFC is still a mystery and raises many questions whether he will ever fight again.
UFC President Dana White appeared on the ‘Skip And Shannon: Undisputed Live’ show on FOX Sports 1 this morning and opened up about Conor Mcgregor if he returns to the UFC, he has to defend his belt. (transcript via BJPenn)
“If Conor McGregor fights next year, that’ll be awesome. If Conor McGregor doesn’t fight, the UFC will go on. […] There’s two different sides to this coin, there’s the one that you just said [about it being hard to wake up in the morning and get hit in the face when you’re so rich], then there’s the one where there is only many trips you can go on and there’s only so much stuff you can buy before you start to get bored and you want to get back in the game. So, I don’t know. I don’t really have a feel on what Conor wants to do. Conor’s rich, it’s the holidays, I’m sure his whole family has a great Christmas. We’ll see what the New Year brings.”
“What we have to do, is he needs to defend that [UFC lightweight] title. Nate [Diaz] isn’t even in the title picture. Nate’s ranked – that’s one of those fights that shouldn’t have been made in the first place, but it happened at that time and it was great, it was an amazing fight. People loved it, so somewhere down the line there’s a possibility for a trilogy, but right now he has to defend his title against Tony Ferguson. Tony Ferguson is the fight right now and is the move if he wants to come back. […] Whoever wins the [Edson] Barboza/Khabib [Nurmagomedov] fight while we’re trying to figure out this Conor mess, could end up fighting Tony Ferguson for the opportunity to fight Conor McGregor. So, we’ll see.”
Interestingly, White did rule out, is a fight with Nate Diaz. While Ferguson is currently sidelined after successfully undergoing elbow surgery early this month. The timetable of his return is not known yet.
However, this is all just talk until the self-proclaimed UFC star walks into the Octagon.
What do you think title unification bout between Ferguson and Mcgregor should materialize?
