UFC CEO Dana White doesn’t expect Conor McGregor to return for a year following a knee injury suffered at UFC 329.
McGregor blew his knee out on the first kick of his fight against Max Holloway on July 11th, ending their fight before it even got started. That left a lot of people who payed a whack of cash to watch the fight feeling upset, but it didn’t stop McGregor from vowing to return yet again.
It’ll be a while, though. One week ago, “The Notorious” confirmed the official diagnosis: a tear in his
ACL and a tear in his meniscus on the right knee. McGregor has suffered the same injury on his left knee in the past and came back in nine months. The Irish sports star was hopeful he’d be able to repeat that feat, but White is less optimistic.
Speaking after Sunday’s Zuffa Boxing event featuring Edgar Berlanga vs. Steven Butler, Dana gave an update on his top star.
“We had him on FaceTime tonight ringside,” White said. “But you know, Conor McGregor’s out for a year.”
That’s about standard for an athlete suffering a bad knee injury, and we wouldn’t be surprised if there are more delays given McGregor is now 38 years old. The knee was completely giving out on him during his fight with Max Holloway, which is never a good sign. Other fighters have managed to gut through tears and even win. Carlos Ulberg snapped his ACL but was still able to knock out Jiri Prochazka to win the light heavyweight title. But McGregor went down every time he put weight on the limb.
McGregor explained the situation in a since-deleted tweet, comparing the current injury to the ACL / meniscus tear in his left knee that he suffered against Holloway 13 years ago.
“The left leg is my back leg in fighting stance,” he wrote. “When you strike you move onto your lead leg so the effect was less. I was able to strike sufficiently and enter to a takedown. This current one was my lead leg. The right leg. Every movement was affected.”
McGregor is hoping to come back next summer, but we’ll see how his body responds to rehab and whether he can stay focused on a comeback for the long twelve months it takes to deal with an injury like this.
