Jorge Masvidal can close the door on at least one of the fights he was hoping for. The boss said a matchup with Conor McGregor isn’t going to happen for him.
UFC president Dana White was cornered by TMZ Sports and asked what might be next for McGregor (21-4 MMA, 9-2 UFC), a former featherweight and lightweight champion who is approaching a year since his most recent fight.
White said he expects McGregor to be back by early 2020 at the latest. But he said the recently resurgent Masvidal (34-13 UFC, 11-6 UFC) won’t get a welterweight fight against McGregor, even though McGregor fought twice at the weight class against Nate Diaz in 2016.
“Masvidal’s too big for Conor,” White said. “(McGregor) shouldn’t have (fought at 170). I hated that he did it. Not only did I hate that he did it once, I hated that he did it twice.
“There’s plenty of fights for (Masvidal) in his weight division without Conor. He’s too big for Conor. Conor doesn’t belong at 170. He’s got the balls to fight at 170, but he doesn’t belong there. Hell no, (it won’t happen).”
White wouldn’t commit to a next fight for Masvidal, who is coming off a UFC record-setting five-second knockout of Ben Askren at UFC 239 earlier this month. It was his second straight knockout win. He stopped former title challenger Darren Till with a double bonus-winning knockout in March.
Tuesday, Masvidal’s manager said the fighter planned to only fight either McGregor next, or current welterweight champion Kamaru Usman.
As for McGregor, White also seemed to rule out him fighting the winner of the upcoming lightweight title unification fight between champion Khabib Nurmagomedov and interim champ Dustin Poirier, which headlines UFC 242 in Abu Dhabi.
“I think he’ll either back this year or early next year,” White said. “We’ll see how this whole thing plays out in September. No, (he doesn’t get the Nurmagomedov-Poirier winner), but it’ll shake a lot of things up, whoever wins that fight.”
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