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Michael Chandler kicked off 2023 with the expectation that he’d struggle Conor McGregor.
Now he’s ending 2023 with the primary inactive 12 months of his skilled MMA profession and the hopes that the McGregor struggle will nonetheless materialize in some unspecified time in the future in 2024.
“[Have I been] pissed off at instances? Completely. Irritated? Perhaps a bit of bit right here and there,” Chandler admitted Monday on The MMA Hour. “As a result of we get that rush, we love preventing, we love competing. I do prepare lots so it’s exhausting to coach — even me, even being often called the man who trains lots and I dwell this life, it’s exhausting to have your coaching however not have that carrot dangled in entrance of you and that gentle on the finish of the tunnel of an precise date. However anyone who has seen all of my fights within the UFC to date and even the fights earlier than that, I’ve been extraordinarily lively over the past 15 years.
“I’ve fought extraordinarily exhausting. Some very, very robust fights I’ve had since I got here into the UFC, particularly [since] I fought everyone inside the highest 5 principally. Fights of the Yr, Knockouts of the Yr, all of these various things. So anytime I discover myself being pissed off, I imagine I’m all the time in a position to return to my north star that, hey, it’s going to work out the way in which it’s going to, similar to me coming to the UFC. That door stayed closed till it was time for that door to open. The door opening for this struggle with Conor, every time it’s lastly alleged to be, will probably be, and I’m simply being at peace within the midst of the ready.”
When McGregor, 35, and Chandler, 37, signed on to movie The Final Fighter 31 in February, the expectation was that they’d collide in a blockbuster bout within the second half of 2023. For numerous causes, nevertheless, the matchup failed to come back to fruition. McGregor informed reporters in late October that the UFC was then targeting April for his comeback fight and voiced frustration at his lengthy layoff. The previous two-division UFC champion has not competed since struggling a devastating leg damage in his trilogy bout in opposition to Dustin Poirier in July 2021.
McGregor formally re-entered the UFC’s drug-testing pool on Oct. 8, that means he can be eligible to compete once more on April 8, 2024. An April date would put McGregor and Chandler proper in line to headline the promotion’s upcoming tricentennial extravaganza, UFC 300.
Chandler teased a giant announcement previous to his The MMA Hour look. Whereas that announcement ended up being his partnership with Hiatus Tequila, loads of followers and pundits speculated that it could the McGregor struggle for UFC 300’s principal occasion.
“Hey pay attention, no one would really like the hypothesizing to cease greater than me, alright?” Chandler stated. “And sure, clearly I talked about this huge announcement right this moment, and persons are like, ‘OK, lastly we’re going to get the Conor and Chandler struggle, proper?’ So I do know. To anyone on the market who like ticked off right this moment, I’m sorry, however I simply don’t have any data. Clearly that [UFC 300] can be a dream state of affairs. That’s once I want to struggle, the place I want to struggle, who I might need to struggle. Chandler vs. Conor is going on. I don’t have a date or a location or a UFC quantity for you, nevertheless it’s positively going to occur subsequent 12 months.
“So we’re going to benefit from the holidays and we’re going to remain in form, after which we return into coaching camp in January and I’ll prepare my tail off till that struggle occurs.”
In November, McGregor’s longtime coach at SBG Eire, John Kavanagh, informed MMA Preventing that plans may have changed and the UFC was as an alternative focusing on the “summertime” of 2024 for McGregor’s return struggle. Kavanagh acknowledged that McGregor and his workforce had been “very pissed off” by the information and questioned whether or not the promotion supposed to carry McGregor on the sidelines till Worldwide Struggle Week, which often takes place in July. Kavanagh questioned whether or not UFC officers could have finished so due to a perception that UFC 300 can be a large enough occasion with out McGregor’s presence on the pay-per-view.
Chandler, nevertheless, isn’t shopping for what Kavanagh is promoting.
“Hear, I respect Conor and I respect coach Kavanagh,” Chandler stated. “We’re very cordial, proper? And I don’t must hate Conor to need to go on the market and rip his head off in entrance of tens of millions of individuals. However these guys are excellent at creating their very own narrative and throwing little breadcrumbs on the market which can be simply stale as heck and never even a mouse would eat them. Alright? So simply keep in mind after they say issues, perhaps it’s true, perhaps it’s not true. Perhaps they’re saying issues for the rationale of simply making folks like your self and all of us speculate and in addition [making] me speculate.
“I’ve heard it. I’ve seen Conor discuss different opponents. I’ve seen Conor discuss totally different dates. I’ve seen Conor discuss, utterly dismiss me and act prefer to struggle with me isn’t taking place. These are all ways in which these guys attempt to get inside folks’s heads. Unluckily for them, your boy’s bulletproof, alright? So we’re good. So we’re staying with the plan. We’re proper the place we have to be. I’ve had a 12 months, a year-plus now to consider and visualize knocking Conor out, watching all of his tapes, seeing the coaching footage that’s popping out. I see that he’s coaching, I see that he’s coming again.
“Clearly he joined USADA, obtained again within the USADA testing pool. He’s not doing that except he’s truly coming again. So he’s making an attempt to attend me out, smoke me out, however I’m going to be ready right here, man. The best comeback in fight sports activities historical past, that highway goes by way of one man — and his identify is Michael Chandler.”
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