The UFC is getting ready to dump the remainder of 2024’s major fights on us, now that Riyadh Season Noche UFC is finally looking like tickets will sell out.
Dana White had a productive time at the office on Wednesday night, and the UFC CEO sounds ready to make a series of big announcements regarding the promotion’s biggest stars, including Conor McGregor.
During a new Instagram Live video focused primarily on Power Slap, White sat in the infamous UFC War Room and eyed his wall of upcoming line-ups. He started naming off fighters that were at the top of the remaining UFC events for 2024.
“Talked about Conor today too,” he said. “Got Conor [McGregor] news coming up, we got [Charles] Oliveira news coming up, we got [Michael] Chandler news coming up, we got Max Holloway news coming up. All that good s—. Coming soon.”
Dana White announces Conor McGregor, Michael Chandler & Charles Oliveira fight news is coming up pic.twitter.com/ESpk3B8M8l
— Best MMA Moments (@XcellentMMA) August 29, 2024
— Conor McGregor (@TheNotoriousMMA) August 29, 2024
How soon? It’s unclear. The promotion has been in a state of paralysis as far as announcing big fights since they’ve struggled to sell out the Sphere for Riyadh Season Noche UFC. But at this point there’s just under 3000 tickets left, many sitting around the $1000 price point. It ain’t official yet, but with two weeks to go it does indeed look like the UFC event at the Sphere will sell out.
That means White can start promoting UFC 308: Ilia Topuria vs. Max Holloway. He can announce UFC 309: Jon Jones vs. Stipe Miocic. And he can confirm UFC 310: Conor McGregor vs. Michael Chandler.
Conor McGregor even reacted to the video of White with a wink emoji, for those of you who are still worried the UFC planned on hurling his comeback fight into 2025. So that’s a good sign. As we’ve mentioned previously, McGregor vs. Chandler never came off the board for December, despite comments from White that the fight might not happen this year.
That was all machinations to try and sell Sphere tickets. Now that UFC brass is confident the event is as good as sold out, we can move on to the rest of 2024, which is looking pretty damn fire.