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Michael Chandler's UFC debut has been the subject of much debate and discussion. Since he served as a back-up fighter for UFC 254 and cut weight for it, Dana White stated that there's no hurry to debut Micheal Chandler.
However, Michael Chandler recently posted that his camp started this past week, indicating that a fight has been booked. There were talks of debuting Michael Chandler against Tony Ferguson. But the latter wanted to fight in December while the former Bellator Champion wanted to fight in the co-main event of UFC 257 (headlined by Dustin Poirier vs. Conor McGregor).
With a lot of confusion about the situation, John Morgan from MMA Junkie clarified what was happening, stating on Submission Radio that the UFC is reportedly working on booking Michael Chandler vs. Justin Gaethje for January 23rd. He said:
"My understanding is that the UFC wants to see Michael Chandler vs Justin Gaethje and ideally what they would like is to get it done on January 23rd. That way it's your co-main event to Conor McGregor vs Dustin Poirier. Plus, not only is that a lot of great Lightweight action to move the division forward, if something does happen, you got to have a back-up plan these days. We're talking about everything that's happening with COVID and that's outside of all the injuries. They'd like to have that as the co-main event, so you have a lot of options. If one fighter falls out you can shift some things around. So my understanding is that's what's being worked on. With Chandler posting that he started camp, that kind of shows you that he's in."
Why the stars could align for Michael Chandler
If John Morgan's understanding of the situation is true, then it's a big spot for Michael Chandler to make his debut. Conor McGregor gets more eyes than anyone on the UFC roster, and Michael Chandler will look to make his debut a big one under the spotlight.
It will be interesting to see how it plays out if he faces Justin Gaethje. For The Highlight, it would be a quick turnaround since he fought Khabib Nurmagomedov in the second half of October.
Luckily for Justin Gaethje, Khabib Nurmagomedov mercifully choked him out with a triangle, ensuring that less damage was taken in defeat. It wouldn't be surprising to see the UFC book Michael Chandler against the former Interim Lightweight Champion.
