Max Holloway doesn’t buy Islam Makhachev’s complaints about worthy opponents

It irritates Max Holloway to hear Islam Makhachev talk about a lack of available fights.

Makhachev at one point appeared to shoot down a potential meeting with Dustin Poirier, arguing it made no sense despite Poirier’s recent knockout win over Benoit Saint Denis. He later targeted a June date with the former interim lightweight champ despite his feelings about the matchup.

Holloway said Makhachev isn’t taking into account his own scheduling choices.

“I saw Islam talk about, ‘This fight makes no sense,’ and blah blah blah,” Holloway said on the Mighty video podcast. “I’m like, brother, you should have fought Justin [Gaethje] in February. Why did the guy you knocked out turn around so fast, to fight in February, when you were healthy. You should’ve turned around [and fought in] February.

“Everybody knew you can’t fight in Ramadan, and that’s how come they couldn’t do the fight [at UFC] 300 and he couldn’t get another fight. But he’s complaining like, “I can’t get fights.” I’m like, you’re only fighting around the times that you want to fight. It’s not that you can’t get fights. You’re just not taking the fights that are offered because of certain things that are going on. If you really wanted to fight, I thought you would have turned around and fought in February.”

Makhachev hasn’t fought since this past October, when he knocked out then-featherweight champ Alexander Volkanovski in a rematch of their 2023 meeting. That put Gaethje, who this past July knocked out Poirier in a rematch, in pole position for a title shot. But instead, Gaethje was booked to face Holloway at UFC 300.

Holloway moves up in weight for the second time since a 2019 bid for the interim lightweight title, which Poirier won via unanimous decision. There was much confusion as to why Gaethje took the Holloway bout with a potential title shot on the line, but Holloway backed his opponent.

“What’s Justin going to do, wait?” he said.

Holloway’s opinion is likely to fall on deaf ears with the current lightweight champ, not to mention hardcore MMA fans. But of course, if he’s able to upset Gaethje, he is certain to get everyone’s attention.

“A lot of people are giving me stuff, like, ‘You’re wasting your time,’” he said. “And I just have to remind them – I don’t know if you ever watched the movie Troy, but it’s like, ‘That’s why no one is going to remember your name.’”

Below is Holloway’s full interview with former UFC flyweight champion Demetrious Johnson on the Mighty podcast.