Dana White on Khabib’s year-long absence: You can’t sit out and wait that long

By Milan Ordoñez @Mr_Ordonez

UFC lightweight champion Khabib Nurmagomedov was slapped with a nine-month suspension for his involvement in the UFC 229 post-fight brawl that involved Conor McGregor last October. Since it would be retroactive to the time of the incident, he will be eligible to compete by July.

However, his management team claimed that Khabib is no longer interested in competing in the state of Nevada and would rather fight in November in New York, which potentially puts him out of action for a total of 13 months. Given these plans, UFC president Dana White is now looking at other options.

“Guys can’t sit out and wait that long if they have the title, you can’t do it,” White said during his UFC 234 post-fight media scrum (transcript by MMA Mania). “So if that’s true and he is going to do that, then we have to figure out something else.

“You start looking at whether it’s Conor McGregor and Tony Ferguson, or one of these other guys. Whoever wants to…when opportunity knocks, answer the door. So we will see how this thing plays out. That’s the criteria.”

A possible fight between Conor McGregor and Donald Cerrone has been brought up for a while now, and according to “Cowboy” the said matchup would be for the interim 155-pound title.