{"id":39227,"date":"2026-07-12T05:59:12","date_gmt":"2026-07-12T05:59:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.sherdog.com\/news\/news\/Knee-injury-ends-Conor-McGregors-return-69-seconds-into-UFC-329-main-event-201845"},"modified":"2026-07-12T05:59:12","modified_gmt":"2026-07-12T05:59:12","slug":"knee-injury-ends-conor-mcgregors-return-69-seconds-into-ufc-329-main-event","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/knee-injury-ends-conor-mcgregors-return-69-seconds-into-ufc-329-main-event\/","title":{"rendered":"Knee injury ends Conor McGregor\u2019s return 69 seconds into UFC 329 main event"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
<\/div>\n

An apparent knee injury snuffed out whatever magic Conor
\nMcGregor<\/a> planned to rekindle in his first
\nUltimate Fighting Championship<\/a> assignment in five years.<\/p>\n

Max
\nHolloway<\/a> was awarded an anticlimactic technical knockout over
\nthe SBG Ireland cornerstone in the first round of their
\nUFC 329<\/a> headliner on Saturday at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas. A
\ndisappointed and dejected McGregor (22-7, 10-5 UFC)\u2014who had beaten
\nthe Hawaiian by unanimous decision in their first meeting in
\n2013\u2014bowed out 1:09 into Round 1.<\/p>\n

It was essentially over before it began. McGregor appeared to
\nsuffer the injury while throwing a jumping round kick inside the
\nfirst 10 seconds. He collapsed on multiple occasions afterward,
\nunable to put any weight on his right leg while he attempted to
\nengage Holloway (28-9, 24-9 UFC).
\nIt soon became clear to all involved that McGregor was compromised
\nto such an extent that he could not move forward with the
\nmatch<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, former Cage Warriors champion Paddy
\nPimblett<\/a> put Benoit St.
\nDenis<\/a> to sleep with a Peruvian necktie in the first round of
\ntheir lightweight co-main event.
\nSt. Denis (17-4, 9-4 UFC) lost consciousness 52 seconds into Round
\n1<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

<\/center>
Pimblett (24-4, 8-1 UFC) survived the initial burst of offense from
\nthe Frenchman and made him pay for an ill-conceived takedown
\nattempt. The Next Generation MMA star zeroed in on St. Denis\u2019
\nexposed neck, bullied him to the canvas and proceeded to tighten
\nthe strings on the necktie. Pimblett then moved to a seated
\nposition\u2014with one leg over the back, the other over the head\u2014and
\nmaximized torque until the onetime French Special Forces operator
\nlost his grip on reality.<\/p>\n

It was the second sub-minute finish for Pimblett in 28 professional
\nappearances.<\/p>\n

Further down the main draw, Mario
\nBautista<\/a> avenged a January 2019 submission defeat to Cory
\nSandhagen<\/a> and laid claim to a unanimous decision over the
\nElevation Fight Team rep in their three-round bantamweight rematch.
\nAll three cageside judges scored it the same: 29-28 for Bautista
\n(18-3, 12-3 UFC).<\/p>\n

Sandhagen (18-7, 11-6 UFC) was undone by two key moments. Bautista
\nappeared to damage his left leg with an attempted Suloev stretch
\nkneebar late in the first round and dropped him with a sweeping
\nleft hook in the third. The rest of their 15-minute battle was
\nmarked by give-and-take action\u2014Sandhagen opened a cut near the MMA
\nLab export\u2019s right eye in the second round\u2014in which neither man
\ngained a discernible advantage.<\/p>\n

Bautista, 33, has won 10 of his past 11 bouts.<\/p>\n

Elsewhere, Factory X mainstay Brandon
\nRoyval<\/a> rebounded from back-to-back losses to Joshua Van<\/a>
\nand Manel Kape<\/a>,
\nas he dismissed Lone\u2019er
\nKavanagh<\/a> with a rear-naked choke in the third round of their
\nflyweight barnburner.
\nKavanagh (10-2, 3-2 UFC) waved the white flag of surrender 3:40
\ninto Round 3<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

<\/center>
\n
Royval (18-9, 8-5 UFC) leaned into his jab and struck for a
\ntakedown in the first round, then averted disaster in the second.
\nThere, Kavanagh set him on rubber legs with a clean right hand over
\nthe top, pushed him to the canvas and cut loose with vicious
\nelbow-laced ground-and-pound. Royval called upon his extensive
\nexperience, regained his faculties and hit the reset button ahead
\nof the third round. The onetime Legacy Fighting Alliance champion
\nfought fire with fire, shed an ill-advised guillotine choke from
\nKavanagh, set up in top position and paired ground-and-pound with
\nrepeated submission attempts. Royval eventually settled on the
\nrear-naked choke, snaked his arms into place and let his squeeze
\nfinish the job.<\/p>\n

It was Royval\u2019s first submission win since May 7, 2022.<\/p>\n

Finally, former King of the Cage champion King Green<\/a>
\nrallied to stop Terrance
\nMcKinney<\/a> with punches in the first round of their lightweight
\nappetizer. In the midst of a late-career resurgence,
\n
\nGreen (36-17-1, 17-12-1 UFC) drew the curtain 4:59 into Round
\n1<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

McKinney (18-9, 8-6 UFC) dominated virtually every second of the
\nmatch. He opened multiple cuts on Green\u2019s face, swarmed him with
\nfast-twitch punches, secured a takedown and climbed to full mount.
\nMcKinney then applied his ground-and-pound and appeared to be
\nwithin reach of another first-round finish but allowed his Pinnacle
\nMMA-trained counterpart to escape to his feet. Green took advantage
\nof the window of opportunity, pinned the Fusion X-Cel rep to the
\nfence, connected with punches to the body and forced him into a
\ndefensive shell at the base of the cage. More punches followed,
\nprompting referee Kerry Hatley to intervene.<\/p>\n

Green, who turns 40 in September, has rattled off four straight
\nwins.<\/p>\n

Continue Reading \u00bb<\/strong>
\nUFC 329 Prelims: Robert Whittaker, Adrian Yanez, Luke Riley shine
\non finish-filled undercard<\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

An apparent knee injury snuffed out whatever magic Conor McGregor planned to rekindle in his first Ultimate Fighting Championship assignment in five years. Max Holloway was awarded an anticlimactic technical knockout over the SBG Ireland cornerstone in the first round of their UFC 329 headliner on Saturday at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas. A disappointed […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":39228,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[150],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-39227","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-martial-arts-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39227","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39227"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39227\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/39228"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39227"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39227"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39227"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}