Athletes
Tommy McMillen | Welcome to The Gun Show
Finally Healthy, Unbeaten Featherweight Wants To Stay Active, Stack Wins
Tommy McMillen has amassed a perfect record through the first 10 fights of his professional career, claiming eight of those wins between 2023 and 2025, culminating in his Dana White’s Contender Series win over David Mgoyan last fall in Las Vegas. All but the victory that earned him a place on the UFC roster came by first-round stoppage, and the majority of them came while McMillen was dealing with a pinched sciatic nerve that limited his ability to prepare.
“People don’t understand how bad of an injury I was dealing with,” McMillen said ahead of his fight with Alberto Montes in Oklahoma City. “It was a two-year injury — a pinched sciatic nerve in my back, so any time I would do any kind of running, jumping, training, my foot would go numb… For the Mgoyan fight, I walked out and my foot was numb; it was hard to warm up. I didn’t get to grapple at all for that camp and I shut down a high-level grappler — people don’t put enough respect on that kid’s name; he’d beat a lot of guys in the UFC — and I was able to shut down his wrestling without wrestling or grappling in camp, or for a prior year before that.
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“I was beating up dudes on the regional scene, taking fights at 160, 170 (pounds) — whatever I could find and get offered to get that checkmark in my win column and get to the UFC,” continued McMillen. “I was barely training for a lot of those fights. I had to do modified fight camps because I couldn’t do much at all. Even hitting mitts — moving around, hitting mitts — every time I would do a five-minute round with somebody, my foot would go numb and we’d have to wake it back up, get the blood flowing… It was a headache. It was super-frustrating because I never thought it would get better, but I kept working with some very good doctors and we finally got to the bottom of it, figuring out some movements and stuff that works for me. I still went into my debut with it — it didn’t go away until five weeks, six weeks out from that fight — and it’s been gone since.”
After a knock-down, drag-out battle with Mgoyan to secure his spot in the UFC featherweight ranks, McMillen debuted in April opposite returning Italian Manolo Zecchini and the two got after it from the outset.
For nearly three-and-a-half minutes, it was Rock’em Sock’em Robots, with McMillen frequently connecting with the cleaner, more impactful blows. As the fight wore on, the unbeaten Contender Series grad started to really take control and hurt Zecchini, finally stopping him amidst a hail of offense along the fence that left him bleeding, battered, and broken.
“I was expecting that kid to kind of float on the outside, pick his chances and his shots to kind of blitz in on me like somebody a little bit smaller than you should do, but I guess it was a good lesson to expect the unexpected,” offered McMillen. “He ran at me — that kid ran at me and I kept moving backwards, cracking him with big shots, and I finally got to a point in that fight where I thought, ‘I’ve got this kid hurt and he’s gonna keep running at me; I’m gonna fight fire with fire’ because I can do that if I have to… I can fight all different kind of styles, all different ways — I’m a full mixed martial artist; I’ve been doing this since I was three years old. I knew I could get him out of there in the first round when I knew how bad I had him hurt, so I just kind of went gas pedal down, got in his face and broke him.”
The battle earned the duo Fight of the Night honors and the hundred thousand dollars that comes along with it, while also signaling that the undefeated finisher McMillen was someone to keep tabs on in the talent-rich 145-pound weight class.
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Finally healthy and fresh off a highlight reel win in his debut, the 28-year-old didn’t waste any time booking his sophomore appearance inside the Octagon, quickly signing on to face Montes this weekend. While the turnaround has been relatively quick, the returns from his fight in April coupled with being able to execute a complete camp the way he would like have “Gun” feeling like he’s grown by leaps and bounds.
“This has been the healthiest fight camp of my life, and I don’t think it’s a coincidence that I feel like in this fight camp, I’ve grown more than my entire career combined,” said McMillen. “That’s why I fought my debut in April and by May I had this fight announced because I’m finally healthy. I know what it’s like to not be able to fight, to be unhealthy, and I just want to keep taking advantage of it as long as I can stay healthy… I’d say the biggest thing is just being able to train fully healthy in my fight camps; that has made a night and day difference for sure. I think going through that war with Mgoyan and Zecchini — he’s still in the UFC and anybody in the UFC is a high-level dude — in those four minutes alone, when I watch back that fight, I don’t look at what I did correctly or focus on the 100k bonus; that’s nothing to me.
Tommy McMillen Gets Debut TKO Victory | UFC Fight Night: Moicano vs Duncan
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Tommy McMillen Gets Debut TKO Victory | UFC Fight Night: Moicano vs Duncan
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“At the end of the day, I look at how I can become the best mixed martial artist and I pick apart the way I fought, the things I was doing wrong… I learned a lot in that fight and I was able to go focus on those things in the gym, correct those things, and you can see a night and day difference in my cage rounds against very high-level guys, so I’m super-excited to go out there and show everybody the complete mixed martial artist I am this Saturday.”
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This weekend’s main card pairing with Montes is an excellent test for the confident and candid finisher, as the 32-year-old also enters off a slick finish in his promotional debut earlier this year, having put TUF winner Ricky Turcios to sleep at UFC 326 in March. Currently riding a four-fight winning streak where each of his foes has been submitted, the Venezuelan promises to be the toughest test to date for the streaking McMillen.
Not that he foresees any trouble getting Montes out of there on Saturday.
“The game plan is simple: I’m gonna go in there and throw some sick s***, and if that doesn’t work, I’m gonna throw some more sick s***,” he said with a smirk when asked his thoughts on his opponent. “I’m gonna break this kid. It’s not gonna go all three rounds — I’m gonna finish him and I’m gonna get another 100k bonus.”
Should things play out as he anticipates, McMillen’s outlook for the future can be summed up in two words: activity and economics.
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“I’m gonna stay busy,” he said. “As long as I can get out of the fight healthy on Saturday, I just wanna stay busy, keep fighting, keep getting better and keep growing as a mixed martial artist. I’m lucky to have the team I have around me. I know that I have what it takes to become one of the best to ever do it, and that’s the thing that motivates me to keep staying locked in, keep training, keep getting better. I’m ready to keep going… I’ll fight anybody in my weight class for the right amount of money,” he added. “If they called me tomorrow and wanted me to fight the champ and they wanted to pay me, I’d go in there and I know I can win. But I’m in no rush to call out Top 15 guys — I wanna cash some paychecks, knock some dudes out for 100k, keep stacking my money. I’m gonna stay active.
“You guys are gonna see a lot of me.”
UFC Fight Night: Du Plessis vs Usman took place live from Paycom Center in Oklahoma City on July 18, 2026. See the final Prelim & Main Card Results, Official Scorecards and Who Won Bonuses - and relive the action on UFC FIGHT PASS!
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