Conor McGregor’s next fight at UFC 303 appears all but doomed.
As fight fans await official word, MMA journalist Ariel Helwani reports that the Conor McGregor vs. Michael Chandler fight being called off is “just a formality at this point.”
“It’s not 100% off but I’d be extremely surprised at this point if it remains and they are actively negotiating with multiple camps to find a replacement,” Helwani wrote Thursday on X. “It’s all up in the air still but they are proceeding at this time like they need a replacement.”
McGregor, 35, hinted on his Instagram story Wednesday night that he may be dealing with some sort of injury.
He posted an old clip of him talking about injuries in the sport, including a caption with the emojis: “😔🙏.”
“I think the more resistance you train with, the less movement and the more injury. But the less resistance you train with, the more movement and the less injury,” McGregor said in the old clips he posted.
Rumors started flying about a cancellation after a Dublin, Ireland, press conference on June 3 was canceled by the UFC on 12 hours’ notice without any reason given.
Just one week prior, McGregor was seen partying with his fiancee Dee Devlin in Ireland, so he was ostensibly healthy at that time.
The Irish-born fighter snapped his shin bone in a July 2021 fight against Dustin Poirier and is now set to surpass three years without stepping into the octagon.
Max Holloway was the hopeful replacement, but his social media shows that he has been in Japan while nearly every other champion is booked to fight on other dates.
UFC 303 is two weeks from Saturday and the promotion continues to search for a replacement, although nothing is as big as a McGregor bout.
McGregor holds the record for the three largest pay-per-view gates in company history and the promotion had boasted of a gate worth more than $20 million for UFC 303.
