Joe Rogan appears to be highly doubtful that Conor McGregor can successfully bounce back from the broken leg he suffered against Dustin Poirier back in 2021.
That’s not to say Rogan thinks McGregor won’t be able to compete again, but he is very sceptical about his chances of rediscovering the form that saw him become a two-division champion in his heyday.
““No one comes back from that,” Rogan said on his podcast. “No one has ever come back from that catastrophic leg break. The shin break. Not a single athlete has come back from it and performed at the same level. Anderson Silva’s the only guy who came back and fought multiple times, and he was not the same guy.”
Rogan went on to argue that the now 35-year-old McGregor should be avoiding big name fights with the likes of Islam Makhachev or Michael Chandler for his comeback fight and instead should just try to get a win under his belt against an unranked opponent.
“I would want a tune up fight, 100 percent,” Rogan said. “I would not want him going right in there against Islam Makhachev. That’s him. That’s why he’s a champion. He’s a warrior. One of the things he said about the Dustin Poirier, the second fight but the first of the most recent ones where he got knocked out, he said, ‘I was inactive, it caught up to me, I could feel it while I was in there. My timing wasn’t as good.’ You need to be active to be at the highest levels of mixed martial arts competition.
“I just don’t see how you can take two years off, multiple surgeries, get on juice, get off juice and jump in there against the best in the world. Maybe he can do it, but if I was his coach and the option was available, I’d say let’s get someone who’s not even in the top 15. Let’s get some guy who is beatable but a good test. We’ll call it a tune-up fight. We get to see how you perform. This guy gets an opportunity to beat Conor McGregor, you get to test your skills again and feel the lights and feel the pressure, get your timing back, have that fight, [then] six months later you have a big fight.”
