The backstory to Saturday’s UFC 329 main event dates to August 17, 2013, when Conor McGregor defeated a 21-year-old Max Holloway by unanimous decision on the undercard of UFC Fight Night 26 in Boston — a prelim fight between two men nobody had circled as future champions.
McGregor was four fights into his UFC run and still building the persona that would carry him to two titles. Holloway was a raw prospect with a 7-2 record, called up young and thrown in against one of the promotion’s fastest-rising talents. The judges scored it 30-27, 30-27, and 30-26 for McGregor.
What the scorecards don’t show is that McGregor tore his ACL during the fight and leaned heavily on his wrestling to control Holloway on the mat down the stretch — a detail that stands out given how much of his later reputation was built on his striking. Holloway wobbled McGregor with a head kick late in the opening round, a flash of the volume striker he would become, but it was not enough against McGregor’s control time.
The aftermath sent the two careers in very different directions. McGregor sat out roughly ten months to recover, then built the run that made him the first simultaneous two-division UFC champion. Holloway assembled one of the deepest featherweight resumes in company history and later held the BMF title.
That 2013 fight is why the rematch carries the weight it does. The man who lost that night enters UFC 329 as the betting favorite, while the man who won it returns from a five-year absence making his welterweight debut.
