TUF 31 lightweight tournament winner Kurt Holobough shared his thoughts on Conor McGregor’s performance as a coach and his chances in a fight against Michael Chandler.
Conor McGregor has been talking the talk about an incredible return to active UFC competition, but will he put in the hard work needed to walk the walk? Based on his recent outing as a coach on The Ultimate Fighter, some of the fighters on the show have their doubts.
TUF 31 lightweight tournament winner Kurt Holobaugh was on Team Chandler, so he doesn’t have as much behind the scenes information as fighters on Team McGregor. But he says he did see the other team returning to the TUF house early when “The Notorious” didn’t show up for practice. In a new interview with BJPENN Radio, Holobaugh went in-depth on what he witnessed.
“No, he definitely missed a lot,” Holobaugh said. “I don’t think he showed up to one weigh-in. I know there were several times where they may have canceled their practices.”
“I remember sometimes the guys would get all the way to the Apex, our team in a sense enjoyed it when they would go because we loved the hours we had,” he continued. “We had 10 a.m. and 4 p.m. and they had 12 p.m. and 6 p.m., so by the time we would get back to the house just before six, that is when we had time to cook and shower, there weren’t many people in the house, chill in the hot tub.”
“All of a sudden they came back in several times and we thought they were training and they said they canceled it. There were quite of few times Conor didn’t show and Conor canceled practices. I definitely think he could have been way more involved than he was.”
Team McGregor fighter Aaron McKenzie has gone on the record admitting Mac rarely showed up for morning practices but insisted they always had assistant coaches there ready to go. Holobaugh’s account certainly differs from that, and we’d be remiss if we didn’t mention that grudges may be impacting people’s views here. It was Kurt Holobaugh’s win over Lee Hammond that kicked off the infamous TUF 31 shoving match between Chandler and McGregor.
Since then, Conor has nicknamed Kurt “Hobo.”
When it comes to the coach’s fight between McGregor and Chandler, there’s no question as to who Kurt Holobaugh thinks is training harder.
“After spending a lot of time with Michael Chandler and seeing how Michael Chandler trains, and then knowing who Conor is and what Conor is doing and how Conor is training, I have to give the edge to my guy, Chandler,” Holobaugh said. “I think he’s going to want it so much more than Conor is going to want it.”
“Either one of them gets the chance to quit, Chandler’s not going to quit. But if Conor gets the chance to quit, he’s going to want to get out of there. And that is when Michael Chandler will finish him off.”