Michael Chandler already beat Conor McGregor to the punch in one small way: He already made his feature film debut years before the Irishman’s villainous turn in the recently released “Road House” remake.
“ ‘Be Afraid,’ yeah, I played a town bully,” the standout UFC lightweight told The Post with a laugh during a recent video call. “Had a few lines; just a few lines.”
While many in and around the MMA space felt compelled to check out McGregor’s first dramatic foray into acting, don’t expect the same of Chandler, at least until after the two finally have their date in the octagon June 29 at UFC 303.
For Chandler, it’s just a bit too strange to watch a piece of entertainment featuring a guy he intends to knock out in Las Vegas next month in their welterweight showdown.
“Watching a movie with my opponent, it just seems weird to me right now, honestly,” explains Chandler, who noted he filmed a small bit for the highlight package of star Jake Gyllenhaal’s character as a fighter the film’s protagonist knocked out. “If I wasn’t in training camp, wasn’t fighting him, if it came out two years from now, I definitely would have already watched it by now. So, that’s no disrespect to the movie.”
The real drama between Chandler and McGregor has been roughly a year of uncertainty regarding when — or even if — the two would actually face each other after appearing as opposing coaches on the most recent season of “The Ultimate Fighter.”
Typically, such a matchup would come not long after the completion of a “TUF” season, if not sooner, but Chandler had been left to twist in the wind waiting on McGregor and the UFC to set a date long past the final episode of the reality competition series in mid-August.
“It’s really funny how it felt really, really, really long and it was very long,” Chandler says, “I journaled a lot; I could probably write a book about just the process.”
The matchup will be McGregor’s first time competing since suffering a fractured left tibia during his July 2021 loss to Dustin Poirier.
Incidentally, Chandler’s last bout was also a setback against Poirier, losing by rear-naked choke submission in November 2022 at Madison Square Garden.
As frustrating as it was awaiting word of the fight, Chandler never wavered in his desire to hold out to face McGregor, and he says the UFC never offered him an alternative, which buoyed his belief that the fight would eventually go down.
Nonetheless, this represents by far the longest gap between fights in Chandler’s career — ditto for McGregor, who will be almost three years removed from competition and nearly 4 ½ from his last victory — and it offered the 38-year-old the chance to focus on elements outside of fighting.
“I got to spend more time with my family than I ever have,” Chandler said, noting the positives. “I did a lot of business stuff outside of fighting, raised money for charity, philanthropy. I was busy. I kept busy.”
Chandler is quick to credit the support of wife Brie “coaching me through” the more “tough” and restless days awaiting the opportunity to compete against the biggest star in MMA history.
Once Chandler does get his hands on McGregor, the former Bellator lightweight champion has little doubt of what he will do to the original UFC “champ-champ” who became a simultaneous two-division belt holder at the Garden in November 2016.
“I truly believe what I’m going to do to him on June 29 is going to warrant and merit him never stepping back into the octagon,” proclaims Chandler with conviction.
It wouldn’t be the most surprising thing for McGregor to walk away after this one given the potentially lucrative opportunities that may await him in Hollywood given the favorable reception to his “Road House” performance, but Chandler won’t be joining him in retirement regardless.
Chandler, who challenged unsuccessfully for the UFC lightweight crown in May 2021, still harbors dreams of gold around his waist after arriving in the promotion earlier that year.
The former Missouri wrestler doesn’t speak as if the end is anywhere in his view.
When that day comes, Chandler envisions speaking on stages, writing books, and “being on camera” in either movies or shows.
One thing he’ll never do: enter politics.
“Politics, I’m not allowed to do. My wife said I’m not gonna be married to a politician,” Chandler says. ”She’s like, ‘Hey, you can do whatever you want, OK? Just, you can’t go into politics.”