Gilbert Burns was frustrated by Conor McGregor.
After The Ultimate Fighter 31 was announced, the cast was set but after McGregor and Michael Chandler were announced as coaches, the Irishman got his own fighters on the show. With that, one of Burns’ teammates in Loik Radzhabov was removed from the show which made Burns angry.
Although Radzhabov ended up getting a short-notice fight at UFC 285, Burns was still angry that McGregor got him removed from the show.
“I get it, whenever you’re Conor McGregor in the UFC, you can do different things. I get it. I just think if I’m doing The Ultimate Fighter show and I have two or three guys that I want to put in, I would let Dana [White] know before and I would put those guys there and get quarantined like everybody and do the whole thing like everybody,” Burns said to MMAFighting. “Like I need these three guys inside, but you’re not going to come to the day to film and do that. That’s why I got mad. It is what it is. I’m happy Loik is in the UFC. Unfortunately, first fight was against our own guy Estaban, but yeah, it’s good that at least now he’s in the UFC. I’m very happy. Short notice, he got a fight in five days, (and) killed himself to make weight, but I think Loik will make a lot of noise in the lightweight division.”
With Conor McGregor and Michael Chandler coaching TUF, the two are set to fight at welterweight later this year. Ahead of the scrap, the Irishman has said with a win he wants a title shot at 170lbs to try and win titles in three different weight classes.
If McGregor gets a title shot at welterweight, Gilbert Burns, ranked fifth at 170lbs, doesn’t think the Irishman will fare well in the division. Instead, he thinks anyone in the top-five finishes McGregor inside three rounds.
“The only thing he can do at 170 is make whoever’s the champion rich. I hope it’s me, but if it’s Leon [Edwards], if it’s Colby [Covington], whoever it is, you’re going to get a lot of money, but I don’t think it’s going to be a hard fight. Whenever [McGregor] is committed to training, no whiskey, no crazy stuff, if they lock him up and this guy’s focused on training, he’s very dangerous. But I don’t think that’s the case. But that’s at 155. At 170, it’s a whole different game. We’re all like 190 [pounds], lean, mean, fighting the best guys in the world, and this guy thinks he’s going to jump out of the yacht and beat me, beat one of the top 5 [fighters]? Guaranteed, no way he’s doing that… I guarantee anyone in the top-five will finish him inside three rounds. He’s done.”
Gilbert Burns, meanwhile, is set to return to the Octagon in the co-main event of UFC 287 against Jorge Masvidal.
