The whirlwind ride for UFC and Conor McGregor will have a satisfactory ending, as the 27-year-old will take on Nate Diaz at UFC 200 on July 9.
McGregor himself tweeted the news early Monday morning:
This ends one of the most unusual situations involving a fighter in UFC history. McGregor and Diaz agreed to a match at UFC 200 on March 30, less than four weeks after Diaz handed McGregor his first UFC loss.
On April 19, McGregor sent out a cryptic tweet saying that he was going to “retire young”:
White appeared on SportsCenter that same day and announced McGregor had been pulled off the UFC 200 card because he was refusing to fly to Las Vegas and do the mandatory promotional activities, per ESPN.com’s Brett Okamoto.
“We pulled Conor McGregor from UFC 200 and we’re working on other fights right now,” White said. “Conor did not want to come to Las Vegas and film the commercial and be a part of the marketing. He’s in Iceland training. Is Conor retiring? Only he can answer that question. I don’t know.”
One day later, White appeared on Fox Sports 1’s UFC Tonight and said the “window is pretty much closed” on McGregor being put back on UFC 200:
After nearly 48 hours of silence from McGregor’s side, he finally addressed the situation in a post on his official Facebook page:
It was still uncertain if the bout between McGregor and Diaz would be put back on the UFC 200 card following that message. He did give the company plenty of time to make it happen, as there are still more than two months to go before the show.
Despite all the controversy and White’s initial insistence McGregor would not have a spot on the landmark event, UFC is still a business. McGregor has been great for UFC on the events he has headlined, per Forbes (via SportsCenter):
Even though UFC 200 has a deep card, with Miesha Tate defending the women’s bantamweight title against Amanda Nunes and Jose Aldo challenging Frankie Edgar, the show was going to be built around McGregor.
Luckily, UFC and McGregor were able to reach an agreement. UFC 200 will take place on July 9 with the biggest star in the sport headlining the show.
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