Conor McGregor insists he would have defended the UFC featherweight title in March

Conor McGregor is fond of forging new ground.

One of the reasons that 'The Notorious' has never defended any of his titles is that fresh and more exciting opportunities have presented themselves to him instead. Rather than defend his Cage Warriors featherweight title in 2012, McGregor was afforded the chance to become a two-weight world champion by fighting for lightweight gold. Rather than defend his UFC featherweight title, McGregor was keen on avenging his defeat to Nate Diaz that came about due to the fact that his original opponent, Rafael dos Anjos, fell out when they were scheduled to fight for the lightweight title at UFC 196 and Diaz saw his hand raised in an upset. McGregor was then allowed to finally challenge for the 155lbs title at UFC 205 and he was not going to pass up the chance to make history by becoming the first ever two-weight UFC champion. In spite of the understandable reasons for never defending a title, McGregor has earned himself a bit of a reputation among his fellow fighters and the Dubliner saw his featherweight crown stripped away before the turn of the year, with Jose Aldo promoted from interim to undisputed champion and Max Holloway claiming the interim strap with a victory over Anthony Pettis in December. McGregor made clear his intention to step away from the Octagon for several months so that he could be present for the arrival of his firstborn but he has since insisted that, had he been asked to defend his 145lbs title before the arrival of his child, McGregor would have been willing and able to fight.

“Before I even got the belt, they wanted to strip me,” McGregor said during an interview with Ariel Helwani in Manchester, as transcribed by MMA Fighting. “That’s what I’m saying, before I even won the belt, it was like, ‘you’ve got to give up this one.’ It’s like, just let me go and get the thing first. Let me go make the history. Let me go do what’s never been done before. And there seemed to be a problem with that, for whatever reason. I don’t know what the problem was, but again, a lack of communication.

“All they had to do was ask. If they had actually came to me and said, ‘Conor, I know you’re prepared to have a baby, I know you’re chilling. If you want to fight for this featherweight belt in March,’ just a nice time, I would’ve went in and would’ve slapped Holloway or this guy he’s fighting, or Aldo, or whoever they wanted. No problem. All they had to do was ask. Instead, they created an interim belt. They gave back the unified belt to a guy I KO’d in 13 seconds. A guy I dominated is now the interim title (holder).

“Look, I was almost a little bit embarrassed for the way it was playing out,” McGregor continued. “Like, is that really how bad it’s gone, that you guys need to kinda create all this fake stuff to sell some stuff? But it (UFC 206) still sold shit. It still sold nothing, so I don’t know.”