The biggest superstar in MMA history has been inactive in the sport for over a year.
Absence certainly makes the heart grow fonder in the case of Conor McGregor as the UFC lightweight champion has been linked with a plethora of opponents for his highly-anticipated return.
Bitter rival Nate Diaz appears to be leading the race to welcome ‘the Notorious’ back to the Octagon, but McGregor’s recent talk of legitimising the belt may indicate he has his eyes on fighting the winner of UFC 216’s main event.
Streaking 155 lbers Tony Ferguson and Kevin Lee will slug it out for the interim strap in the headline act, but McGregor’s recent comments could well just be a promotional technique to ensure that fans actually watch the upcoming title fight. As long as there is a chance the victor might earn a unification bout, there will be enough interest from casual fans to tune in.
Hard to argue with @BrendanSchaub here https://t.co/eXq9EgUhzP
— SportsJOE (@SportsJOEdotie) October 4, 2017
Fans are awaiting UFC 216 not just to find out who the best active lightweight in the world is right now, but also to have a gawk at the inevitable McGregor call-out from the fighter whose hand gets raised. Unless McGregor makes his announcement in the next four weeks, at the beginning of November they will be doing the exact same thing.
One rumoured match-up that has been steadily gathering momentum is a superfight between McGregor and former welterweight champion Georges St-Pierre. The rumblings that GSP would be returning at lightweight following his time off kicked things off.
Then Olivier Aubin-Mercier, a training partner of GSP in Tristar Montreal, made some comments that intensified the shouts of a superfight.
The problem is, St-Pierre is a bit bigger than he was the last time we saw him fight at UFC 167 against Johny Hendricks.
He is set to take on Michael Bisping for the middleweight belt at UFC 217 in New York on November 4 and he’s been cultivating some serious mass ahead of the jump-up in weight. If he were to beat Bisping and call out McGregor, he may need some time to drop down in size to even up the odds.
McGregor has only fought twice above lightweight and both times he found it tough in both welterweight bouts against Diaz. The Stockton native has a 50% record at 170 lbs. GSP, well, he’s only lost twice in his entire storied career.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BZg6iItgIqX/?hl=en&taken-by=georgesstpierre
Plus he’s fucking huge now!
