On Saturday, UFC commentators announced that McGregor relinquished his featherweight title. This comes at a time when the UFC needed to fill in the main event match at UFC 206, which light heavyweight champion Daniel Cormier was supposed to headline. However, Cormier was pulled out of the bout due to an injury.
McGregor originally won the featherweight title last December when he knocked out the former champ, Jose Aldo, at UFC 194. Since then, McGregor has never defended the title. Instead, he fought in two welterweight fights against Nate Diaz, and then he challenged Eddie Alvarez for the lightweight title.
McGregor and his team were aware that the UFC was going to probably make this move. As of now, McGregor has not released any public statements. It’s also not known who McGregor’s next opponent will be, but he did say he would not fight until his first child is born, which could be around May of 2017.
So @TheNotoriousMMA relinquishes FW belt, @josealdojunior becomes champ & @Showtimepettis & @BlessedMMA fight for interim, got that @ufc
— Caroline Pearce (@CarolinePearce) November 27, 2016
Since McGregor is no longer the featherweight champion, Aldo is now in the running to fight for the featherweight title. Max Holloway will face Anthony Pettis at UFC 206, and the winner will be crowned the interim featherweight champion. The winner of that bout will also go on to face Aldo, who is currently the interim champion, some time next year.
