The UFC featherweight champ is sick of the random bullying from the guy that’s not even in his weight class.
Featherweight champion Max Holloway is in a bit of an interesting position when it comes to Conor McGregor. He’s the only UFC fighter at 145 pounds that McGregor failed to finish, and has only gotten better since their initial run-in back in 2013. But McGregor has moved on to lightweight and Holloway plans on staying at featherweight and piling up title defenses.
That hasn’t stopped McGregor from taking regular pot shots at Holloway for no apparent reason.
“The guy keeps jabbing at me and jabbing at me,” Holloway said on The MMA Hour. “And every time I reply they’re like, ‘Why are you doing this? Why are you replying?’ I’m like, ‘Did you guys ever get picked on? You guys like getting picked on? Stand up for your damn self.’ Then the one time I finally — this guy goes and throws a juicy underhand pitch, I take a swing at it and hit it out of the park, and everybody’s all salty. They’re like, ‘Aw, you’re looking for a money [fight].’”
That juicy underhand would probably be this back and forth between the two from the beginning of February. Not that it’s the only time they’ve sparred on social media. But as far as Holloway is concerned, it’s not about angling for a fight. It’s about shutting up a bully.
“I ain’t looking for a money fight,” Max declared. “This guy’s been trying to bully me the whole time. He’s enjoying his retired life, talking about all this kind of wild stuff, and then the one time I attack him, you guys get on me. Get out of here with that stuff. I know what’s on the timetable, and the timetable right now is Ortega, so that’s my full focus.”
The timetable for the Ortega fight is actually still up in the air pending an ankle injury from Holloway, but preliminary plans have the match landing on UFC 226 in July or 227 in August. As for McGregor, many are expecting him to face the winner of the big Tony Ferguson vs. Khabib Nurmagomedov fight at UFC 223 on April 7th.
Until Conor has an actual opponent sorted out, we wouldn’t be surprised if the random sniping at Holloway continues.