Paul Felder believes there is no guarantee that Conor McGregor will return to the UFC in 2023.
The Dubliner has not fought since July 2021 when he suffered a leg break in his trilogy fight with Dustin Poirier and will need to return to the USADA testing pool for six months before he can return to the octagon.
That means the earliest possible time McGregor could fight is this summer, but Felder isn't sure the Notorious will do so.
“I think he’ll always matter, as long as he’s at least teasing the idea of a return but that’s what worries me,” Felder explained on MMA's Fighting's The Fighter vs. The Writer. “He’s so busy. He’s filming Road House and all that kind of stuff. I don’t know if that is over or not. It’s tough.
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“You’re on yachts. You’ve got mansions. You’ve got all this stuff. You’ve got businesses that you’re working on. You’re coming back from a huge injury. You take yourself out of the USADA testing pool. You’ve got to wait to get back in it. I don’t know. I don’t know if we’re going to see him in 2023. To be completely honest with you.”
McGregor has been told the UFC's lightweight division is "passing him by badly", with his comeback looking as far away as it did this time last year.
“I don’t mean this in any disrespect but I do think the division is just passing him by badly,” Felder added. “I think it’s passing a lot of us. I’m older than him by a few years at least but this next generation of fighters, if you’re not in there mixing it up with them and on the mats with those types of dudes everyday — I know he’s training — but he’s going to have to definitely hope for fights like Michael Chandler, who’s a beast but those are the guys you can still compete with.
“You don’t want to be fighting Arman Tsarukyan or [Mateusz] Gamrot or these young, hungry absolute maniacs that are working their way up the division.”
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