UFC featherweight champion Max Holloway has had a wild week. Holloway was supposed to be the savior of the upcoming UFC 223 pay-per-view event.
Tony Ferguson vs. Khabib Nurmagomedov was the original main event of UFC 223 for the lightweight title. However, it was revealed that Ferguson wouldn’t be able to compete due to injury.
The UFC was able to talk featherweight champion Max Holloway into accepting the fight and go for history as if he beats Nurmagomedov then he would be a two-division champion. Prior to the UFC 223 weigh-ins, it was revealed that Holloway had been declared medically unfit to fight. This led to Al Iaquinta stepping in on short notice to say the main event.
Holloway admitted in a recent that while he understood the decision that the New York State Athletic Commision pulled him from the card, the fighter in him was mad.
“When they called it, the fighter in me wanted to fight no matter what,” Holloway told Hawaii News Now (transcript courtesy of MMA Junkie).
“Everybody keeps giving the commission a hard time, but they’re there to protect us,” Holloway said. ”They’re there to protect us for our own good. Who knows what would have happened if they let me go? But they checked vitals before, they did a vital check in the morning. The last one, they just didn’t like the way I looked. They called it, man. Tough. It was a tough one.
“A tough pill to swallow, but that’s what they’re there for. They’re there to protect the fighters. Like (UFC president Dana White) said, they’re there to protect us. This is history, but history can wait.”
“It wasn’t just one day, it was over the days,” Holloway said. “When I first got there, the first week, commission was with me the whole way, through the whole weight cut. I was doing the weight cut, every day they came to check in on me in the room.
“The weight cut day I was cutting weight, they checked on me earlier that night. I went to sleep, they came check me early in the morning, right before weigh-ins. I had a couple more to go and they called it.”
UFC President Dana White has already made it known in interviews after the UFC 222 pay-per-view event that Brian Ortega would be the next challenger for the featherweight title. There’s still no word yet on when this fight will take place.
What are your thoughts on Holloway’s comments about the commission’s decision? Sound off in the comment section below.
