McGregor’s UFC Comeback Ends in 69 Seconds With Knee Injury

Sixty-nine seconds. That’s all it took for Conor McGregor’s long-awaited UFC return to fall apart. At the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas on Saturday night, the 37-year-old stepped into the octagon for the first time in five years and a day to face Max Holloway in a five-round welterweight bout. By the end of the opening minute, it was over.

McGregor threw a left roundhouse kick right at the start. He landed awkwardly on his right knee, and the damage was instant. UFC chief executive Dana White had no doubt what had happened. “We’re assuming a blown ACL [anterior cruciate ligament]. I’m no doctor, but that’s what I figured when I saw it, and doctors think the same thing too,” White said.

This was a rematch of a 2013 featherweight fight McGregor had won by unanimous decision. Heading into Saturday, he was the betting underdog. His record stood at 22-7-0, while Holloway came in at 28-9-0.

The timing cut deep. McGregor’s last UFC victory came in just 40 seconds against Donald Cerrone in January 2020. Then came the 2021 loss to Dustin Poirier, where he broke his left leg—an injury that kept him sidelined for years.

McGregor insisted he had no pre-existing injury before stepping in. On social media, he laid bare his frustration: “I was throwing kicks, planted and jumping, all throughout camp as well as backstage before the fight. This came out of nowhere. I am beyond dark here. I can only describe it as hell.”

The loss adds another wound to a rough stretch. Once the sport’s brightest star—in 2016 he became the first UFC fighter to hold two titles simultaneously at different weights—McGregor’s recent years have been marked by setbacks and time away from competition. His 2017 boxing superfight against Floyd Mayweather Jr. paid him over $100 million, but the octagon has been far less generous since.