‘I’m an idiot,’ McKinney talks about injury at UFC 263

Terrance McKinney won’t ever forget his UFC debut.

Terrance McKinney had one of the more unusual UFC debuts ever this past weekend at UFC 263. The lightweight LFA veteran dropped Matt Frevola with the second punch he threw in their contest and then got the finish with some ground and pound. The win was clocked at seven seconds, making it the third fastest finish in UFC history (tied with Todd Duffee, Chan Sung Jung and the late Ryan Jimmo).

After the sensational finish McKinney launched himself onto the top of the cage to celebrate. He then jumped down and immediately buckled. On the ground it was clear that McKinney had injured his leg somehow during the celebration.

McKinney caught up with MMA Fighting to talk about the win and, of course, the celebration.

“I was like, ‘God dang it, I’m an idiot,’” he said when recounting his first thoughts after realizing he was injured. “Because I remember I was about to hop onto the cage to sit on there, but I remembered they said something like, ‘You can’t do that anymore, or you’ll get fined.’ So it was like so fast, I had to double think, I wasn’t even focused on that, it was like, ‘Oh, I can’t do that.’

“That’s what I was thinking in my head, and then I wasn’t thinking about the landing and I landed on my leg weird.”

McKinney revealed that he doesn’t think he suffered a serious injury, but admitted that more tests needs to be done to determine this. “I don’t think it’s anything major and if it is, it’s not my first injury, so I’ll make sure I take care of my body, listen to it well, and not rush back.”

When the 26-year-old does return to action he’ll do so with a goal of emulating the biggest star the sport has ever produced.

“I’m trying to be the next McGregor,” he said. “I think I have that explosiveness and the power to really just put people out and get some crazy highlight reels and finishes. Just like the McGregor effect, you know? Just the way he took over the whole game, that’s what I’m looking to do in every aspect.”

With the win over Frevola, McKinney improved his pro record to 11-3. In 2019 he appeared on the Contender Series but suffered a flying knee KO loss to Sean Woodson. He lost his following bout, by submission, but responded with three straight wins.

The first of those wins was a 16-second TKO in March. He followed that up with a 17-second headkick KO over Luis Gavinho at LFA 106 in April. The third win, which was just two weeks ago was a first round ground and pound TKO over Michael Irizarry Ortiz in the main event of LFA 109.

McKinney’s win over Frevola gave him three T/KO wins in less than 50 days.