Max Holloway’s win at UFC 318 over Dustin Poirier appears to be his only fight of 2025.
“Blessed” spoiled Poirier’s retirement and retained the BMF title with a unanimous decision victory in the main event of the promotion’s recent pay-per-view event. With the win, the fantasy matchmakers have thrown out a slew of fun ideas for Holloway’s next matchup, but according to the former featherweight titleholder, his next fight likely won’t be until some time in 2026 due to a hand injury suffered in the fight.
“I see a lot of people talking about who’s next, who’s this, there’s a lot of fun fights for me at [lightweight],” Holloway said on his YouTube channel. “There’s [Charles Oliveira], if [Justin Gaethje] gets the next title shot, that would be cool. If I get the next title shot, that’d be sick, but if you have hopes of me fighting before the end of the year, probably not going to happen.
“I see a specialist sometime [soon], I already met with my doctor, now I got to go meet the specialist, but things are not looking to up for me fighting one more time this year. So all of that fight talk is on still, so we just get to see how the [lightweight division] is going to pan out.”
Prior to his victory over Poirier, Holloway was stopped via strikes for the first time in his career by the now lightweight champion Ilia Topuria at UFC 308 this past October. Topuria vacated the 145-pound belt after stopping Holloway, and then brutally knocked out Charles Oliveira in the main event of UFC 317 in June to capture his second title.
Topuria’s next opponent has not been announced. The names that seem to be in play among the fan base for “El Matador” are Arman Tsarukyan, Paddy Pimblett, and Justin Gaethje.
Holloway is wondering why more people aren’t putting his name in the conversation, especially with Gaethje’s name in the mix, who Holloway knocked out at UFC 300 in vicious fashion.
“I get to be a fan a little bit,” Holloway explained. “[I get to] be a father. ... I’m excited for the future, but what’s next? I couldn’t tell you. Now this stupid injury pushed me back a little bit, so we don’t know what’s going to happen.
“But even if I didn’t have this injury, the talks is wild. At the end of the day [fans are saying]... a lot of people are saying me and Ilia don’t make sense because my last fight before this one was Ilia, and he did what he did to me, right? But then how do you make a case for someone that I fought — I know he didn’t fight Ilia, but I fought him — I did what I did to him, and he’s going to fight next for the title after just winning one [fight]. Because most of you guys don’t know what you’re talking about. Most of you guys don’t know shit about fighting.”
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