Yesterday Conor McGregor stated he’d been approached by the UFC about coaching on the next season of The Ultimate Fighter, and now Tony Ferguson has claimed he has been too.
According to Ferguson, the UFC gave him the option to pick who he wanted to coach against, and with his first choice of Khabib Nurmagomedov being ruled out, his next pick was McGregor.
“I’ve Been Asked To Coach On TUF Against Ol’e Fathead, or Anyone Of My Choosing If That Cake-Eatin’ Sum’Bish’ Wouldn’t Show *mack* 🤦♂️ What A Vagina 🏃♂️💨🍃 I’m Always Ready Anytime Anywhere,.. 📈 I Choose You McKnacker 🫵😎 @thenotoriousmma See Ewe🐑 Soon- Thee🏔Champ 🤓 -CSO- 🇺🇸🏆🇲🇽 # My👇Mat 💯,” Ferguson wrote on Twitter.
There’s no official word yet on whether this really is the direction the UFC is trying to pursue for the two fighters, but if it did happen and the two ended up fighting after TUF concludes then it’s not quite the match-up that most fans had in mind for McGregor’s comeback following his leg break.
McGregor’s coach John Kavanagh had recently stated names like Justin Gaethje, Michael Chandler and Nate Diaz as potential candidates, while being somewhat reluctant to see yet another fight with Dustin Poirier.
However, Ferguson wasn’t mentioned, and perhaps with good reason as the last few years haven’t been kind to the 38-year-old ‘El Cucuy’, who has suffered five losses in a row, including a front kick KO loss to Michael Chandler and a submission defeat against Nate Diaz last year.
As such Ferguson has gone from a top contender to sliding completely out of the rankings and there’s been a strong sense that many in the sport believe that retirement would now be his best option.
That being said, the 34-year-old McGregor hasn’t got much to show for the past few years either, suffering back-to-back defeats to Dustin Poirier in his last two Octagon outings back in 2021, with the latter seeing him suffer a broken leg that’s kept him out of action since.
As such, it’s possible that McGregor could be more hesitant than he cares to admit about returning after such a long layoff and serious injury against a top contender like Gaethje (No.3) or Chandler (No.5), and if so a well known but clearly in decline star like Ferguson may be more appealing.
