Dana White on if Conor McGregor fights in 2023: '100%'

UFC president Dana White is pretty confident Irish superstar Conor McGregor will fight in 2023. He is tentatively scheduled to fight Michael Chandler after the conclusion of the latest season of The Ultimate Fighter.

McGregor already teased he looked forward to his “upcoming fight.” Meanwhile Chandler claimed McGregor not fighting him would tarnish the former champion’s legacy.

White sat down with TSN’s Aaron Bronsteter and gave the latest on McGregor and his return.

“100%,” White said in response to a question about the chance McGregor fights in 2023.

However, White said McGregor has yet to reenter the USADA testing pool. USADA previously said athletes need to be in for sixth months and have clean tests before returning to competition.

“We’ll see how that plays out,” White said. “I mean, they’re saying that now, we don’t, who knows? I don’t talk about (expletive) until (expletive) happens. You know what I mean? To sit here and think hypothetically how a million different things could happen. No idea.

“I’m focused on what’s happening this Saturday. And then next Saturday, and you know what I mean, UFC 300 isn’t even in my mind right now. The Conor thing, who the hell knows how that’s gonna play out? Who cares what USADA says? We’ll see what happens when it happens. So I don’t know.”

However even with nothing official, Chandler isn’t worried about potentially the biggest payday of his career either.

“Yes, it’s more of the timing,” Chandler said on KFC Radio. “When you think about the UFC, the biggest mixed martial arts corporation or promotion on the planet, trying to put together Conor, myself, I mean, all these different cards, these guys are putting out fires nonstop. So they haven’t even announced the October card, November card, let alone maybe if we fought in December. I don’t put too much stock into it.”

McGregor is 22-6 in his MMA career but lost three of his last four fights. Two were to Dustin Poirier and one was to Khabib Nurmagomedov for the UFC Lightweight Championship.

McGregor is a former two-weight champion in the promotion but only fought four times since November 12, 2016. He won his second belt over Eddie Alvarez and became the first to hold two belts at once.

Chandler is 23-8 in his MMA career and 2-3 in the UFC after he came over from Bellator. He is the former Bellator Lightweight Champion and did fight for the UFC belt, but lost to Charles Oliveira in May of 2021.