Dana White has a short list of the fighters who built his company, and two of the names on it spent years despising each other. The UFC CEO named Conor McGregor and Khabib Nurmagomedov among the four fighters he credits with putting the promotion on the map, RingSide24 reported Wednesday. The RingSide24 headline doesn’t identify the other two names or carry White’s exact words, so the rest of the list isn’t confirmed here.
The timing fits. White’s comments arrived one day after the eighth anniversary of UFC 229, where on Oct. 6, 2018, Nurmagomedov submitted McGregor to keep the lightweight title. Accounts across X marked the date. UFC Europe posted “#OnThisDay in 2018: Khabib Nurmagomedov tapped out Conor McGregor!” and Spinnin Backfist called it “The biggest MMA fight of all time.” That card sold around 2.4 million pay-per-views, an MMA record. It ended with Nurmagomedov climbing out of the cage, a brawl with McGregor’s teammates, and a nine-month suspension plus a $500,000 fine from the Nevada State Athletic Commission.
McGregor’s case makes itself. He became the first UFC fighter to hold belts in two divisions at once, knocked out José Aldo in 13 seconds, and headlined the five best-selling pay-per-views in company history. He’s now 22-7, sits No. 27 at welterweight in Knockout Daily’s rankings, and last fought July 11, 2026.
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Nurmagomedov’s case is quieter and harder to argue with. He retired 29-0, held the lightweight belt for 1,134 days (the longest reign in division history), and entered the Hall of Fame on June 30, 2022. It all started on the ground floor of a two-story building in Kirovaul, Dagestan, which his father Abdulmanap turned into a gym. He stepped away from coaching and cornering in January 2023.
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Only one of White’s two named pillars is still in play, and McGregor’s name keeps pulling the sport toward him. Daniel Cormier said this week that Justin Gaethje shouldn’t give up his belt for a McGregor fight: “It would harm his legacy to give away the belt & put value in the money fight over being the champ.” Jake Paul, meanwhile, posted a wish list of future opponents on X that included McGregor in both boxing and MMA, tagging @nakisabidarian and writing “Make it happen.”
One of White’s four retired undefeated and went home to Dagestan. The other is still the name everybody else types into their wish lists.
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