‘Iron’ Michael Chandler Reacts to Ian Garry Drama ahead of The Irishman’s return at UFC 296
Rising Irish contender Ian Garry has rubbed a lot of people the wrong way in recent months.
On December 16, ‘The Future’ will return to the Octagon looking to score his 14th career win. Standing in his way of that task will be No. 8 ranked welterweight contender Vicente Luque.
Unbeknownst to many fight fans, Ian Garry and Vicente Luque are actually teammates with both fighters calling Kill Cliff FC home alongside other notable UFC stars, including Brendan Allen and ‘Iron’ Michael Chandler.
However, Garry has found himself in a bit of hot water with Kill Cliff and other gyms, including Team Renegage, the home of reigning welterweight world champion Leon Edwards. In October, Garry revealed that he had been asked to leave Team Renegade and suggested that the call came down from ‘Rocky’ himself. Officials with the gym quickly disputed Garry’s claim that Edwards was “weak-minded” and afraid of a little competition on the mats, noting that Garry was “not adding to the team’s culture” and thus, asked to leave.
Ian Garry’s cocky attitude and “nomad” style of training has seemingly gotten on the nerves of his teams, with one big expectation.
Speaking about Garry’s situation during an appearance on The MMA Hour, Michael Chandler suggested that the Irishman could very well be a world champion one day, so long as he keeps his head on straight and avoids getting sucked into all the drama.
“If he keeps his head on his shoulders, he could be champion one day for sure,” Chandler said. “But he’s got a tough test ahead of him in Vicente. Both of those guys I would consider teammates, probably Vicente more because I’ve trained with Vicente for years and years. Ian is now bouncing around a little bit [too]. We’ll see how it works out for him.”
He continued, “He’s very much a ‘me’ kind of fighter. Whereas I’ve always been a ‘we’ kind of fighter. Focus on the team, more than myself. He’s more ‘I know exactly what to do, I step inside the cage’ kind of guy… I don’t think he’s a bad dude. He picked Conor to beat me I think, so that’s good. He’s his childhood hero man, so me and Ian can have that banter back and forth, it’s all good man,” (h/t BJPenn.com)
With all the recent backlash, it will be curious to see how it affects Ian Garry, if at all, in his return to the Octagon at UFC 296 later this month.
