Podcaster and UFC commentator Joe Rogan has advised Conor McGregor against challenging Kamaru Usman for the welterweight title upon his comeback, suggesting that the Irishman should take a warm-up fight first.
Former featherweight and lightweight UFC champion McGregor has fought at welterweight three times in the promotion, and he has expressed a desire to challenge Usman in his next bout.
McGregor is recovering from a broken leg that he sustained in his last fight – the second of two losses to Dustin Poirier in 2021 – while Usman is expected to defend the welterweight belt against Leon Edwards this summer.
In any case, McGregor has made his intentions clear as he looks to become the UFC’s first ever three-weight champion.
“If Conor wants the most chance of success, I would say fight a guy who is a little below championship level,” Rogan said on the Hotboxin’ with Mike Tyson podcast.
“Maybe [fight] a guy on the come-up who Conor has an advantage over, but it’s still a competitive fight. Give him a test, but don’t put him in there right away with Usman.
“I think, honestly, when boxers come back from a long lay-off and they come back from a loss, one thing that boxers do that’s smart is they have a tune-up fight.
“I think there’s a reason why they’ve been using tune-up fights forever, like astute managers. They know you’ve got to knock the dust off and you’ll be better in the next performance, [rather than] to jump right into a Dustin Poirier or right into Michael Chandler – like right into a guy who’s the elite of the elite.”
McGregor, 33, had not competed in the UFC for two years before he challenged the unbeaten Khabib Nurmagomedov for the lightweight title in October 2018, in a fight that the Irishman lost via submission.
McGregor’s next outing came in January 2020, when he stopped Donald “Cowboy” Cerrone in 40 seconds.
“Notorious” was then out of the Octagon for 12 months and was knocked out – for the first time in his career – when he faced Dustin Poirier in his comeback contest. The pair fought again in July, with McGregor losing via TKO after breaking his leg.
“I think what Conor needs to do is what Conor wants to do,” Rogan added. “If Conor thinks he can go up and fight Usman and make a big payday, try to become a three-division champion, he should do that. He should do whatever he wants to do.
“But if I was like a manager to him, and I said, ‘What’s the best path to success?’ The best path to success is like the ‘Cowboy’ fight. No disrespect to ‘Cowboy’, but that fight turned out to be kind of like a warm-up fight.”
No fighter in UFC history has held titles in three weight classes.
McGregor became the first to hold belts in two UFC divisions simultaneously when he beat Eddie Alvarez in 2016, adding the lightweight gold to the featherweight title that he had won from Jose Aldo in 2015.
