Conor McGregor waited five years for his Octagon comeback. However, his UFC 329 return lasted 69 seconds. While the Irish martial artist is dejected over the loss, his long-standing feud with Machine Gun Kelly resumed last night. The American rapper was quick to take a dig at McGregor after his loss to Max Holloway and rekindle the feud that had been simmering for years.

The rapper posted a carousel on Instagram just hours after UFC 329. He mixed clips of McGregor going down against Max Holloway with a picture of their 2021 red carpet feud at the VMAs.

“Knees weak of old age, the real Conor can’t stand up 🤡 @thenotoriousmma,” MGK posted.

The troll comes as a direct response to the bad blood between the two, back to the 2021 MTV VMAs at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn. McGregor, at the time nursing a broken leg from his UFC 264 loss to Dustin Poirier, walked up to Kelly on the red carpet.

Reports at the time said McGregor approached, looking for a photo with the American rapper. MGK, however, denied it, and his security pushed McGregor away. As a result, the Irish martial artist took offense and broke out into a brawl. Security had to separate the two before it turned into a real fight, though McGregor still managed to fling a drink in Kelly’s direction as he pulled off.

McGregor’s team later disputed that he had asked for a photo or started anything, but the footage of him lunging at Kelly did the damage regardless.

In fact, McGregor brushed the whole thing off afterwards, telling Entertainment Tonight he didn’t even know who Kelly was. “I only fight real fighters, people that actually fight. I certainly don’t fight little vanilla ice white rappers,” he said.

However, five years later, the mock from MGK is a direct punch, as it was right where it hurt for the Irish fighter.

As reported earlier, McGregor hadn’t fought since UFC 264 in July 2021, when he broke his tibia and fibula in the closing seconds of Round 1 against Dustin Poirier. A doctor’s stoppage at that time looked like it might end his career outright. But his recovery alone took a year. Then the UFC’s anti-doping rules kept him from the fight even longer, since fighters have to spend six months back in USADA’s testing pool before they’re eligible to compete.

McGregor returned to the octagon after five years away, rematching Holloway at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas on July 11. He threw a jump kick early; however, his knee gave out. The referee, Mike Beltran, had to wave off the contest in just over a minute. The reaction from the top promotion also came in fast. Dana White, the UFC’s president, told reporters at the post-fight press conference that doctors suspect a torn ACL. McGregor addressed the situation himself a couple of hours later, posting his own statement before the rumors could harden into fact.

“My head gasket is gone, destroyed,” he wrote. “I had no injury/injuries going into the fight. I was throwing kicks, planted and jumping, all throughout camp as well as backstage before the fight,” he clarified.

A feud that never really ended.

The VMA scuffle was never fully buried. In 2023, McGregor took a shot at a video of Kelly skateboarding, posting and quickly deleting a mocking tweet.

Then, just weeks before UFC 329, McGregor finally explained what set him off at the VMAs in the first place. He appeared on The Ariel Helwani show and compared Kelly’s conduct that night to Terence Crawford’s recent needling of Ilia Topuria.

Furthermore, he was quick to add, “Kelly got in his space right after his broken leg. He’s lucky he didn’t get his face broken badly there,” McGregor said.

MGK’s mockery this week is just the next move in an argument that has been running for five years and perhaps could continue. Whether McGregor responds or not is the real question. Given the history, silence would be the surprise.