Former UFC featherweight Chad Mendes is now retired and has no regrets about how his mixed martial arts (MMA) career went — including facing Conor McGregor on short notice.
Following his loss to Alexander Volkanovski at UFC 232 in December, it was reported that Mendes had called time on his career. However, it was never confirmed by “Money” until earlier this month when he revealed he was done on Instagram.
While he wasn’t able to hold UFC gold during his time with the company, Mendes certainly established himself as one of the best featherweights in the world. And he has no regrets about his career either. That includes his UFC 189 interim featherweight title fight with McGregor, which he took on just over a week’s notice:
“Yeah, I mean I think about that stuff all the time [if I had a full camp vs. McGregor] but I don’t have any regrets as far as taking a fight,” Mendes said on Ariel Helwani’s MMA Show on Monday. “That obviously was a 10-day notice fight. Of course I would rather have had a full training camp. [But] I would have been stupid to turn that fight down.
“Who knows? I could have went out there and knocked him out in the first 30 seconds. I could have won that fight. But it helped grow my brand. It’s just something that’s so cool to be able to look back on. My daughter’s going to look back on that one day and be like that’s a huge fight. I mean, being able to walk out to Aaron Lewis playing my walkout song. I don’t think the UFC’s even done that again. But that was just something I’ll never forget and I’ll always have that.”
McGregor Loss Happened For A Reason
McGregor would eventually knock Mendes out in the second round, before going on to knock Jose Aldo out in 13 seconds to become the featherweight champion. Still, Mendes believes things happen for a reason:
“As far as regrets, taking that fight, I definitely don’t have any,” he added. “But obviously, I wish I could have gotten a full training camp and I think about that. Like how would life be different had I won that fight. But like I said, everything happens for a reason, maybe things would have happened for the worse.“
What do you make of Mendes’ comments?
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