Official Conor McGregor thread (part 2). **Read warning in 1st post**

Dtp1979

Swashbuckler wrote: »

I think the prospect of JK looming in the thread made people sensible for a bit.........

Huh?

Depp

Swashbuckler wrote: »

I think the prospect of JK looming in the thread made people sensible for a bit.........

Conor should sack JK and bring Ido in full time! :D:D

Swashbuckler

Dtp1979 wrote:

Huh?

Post #7075 and #7084. The man himself!!

Mellor

wonderfullife wrote: »

He may very well help them out financially behind the scenes but when it comes out in public that Luka needs sponsors for his shorts it just feels wrong.

All fighters need sponsors. Whether Conor has helped him with his training or not doesn't change that. If he handed him $20k last week, he'd still be standing here today with a blank part of shorts and no sponsors.

It also is handing ammunition to Eddie if he wants it. Next time Conor talks about his millions it's an easy response for Eddie to say "well at least my training partner isn't begging for $200 sponsorship, i actually support my own".

Fighters looking for sponsors is really common. I've seen guys signed to the UFC making the same appeal.
If you have a look, I'd say there's definitely fighters from Eddie's team making the same appeal.

nomadchocolate wrote: »

Wouldn't be so sure on that. Duffy got pulled from a bout due to contractual dispute

He wasn't pulled by the UFC. He decline the fight in the first place.

Mellor

John was a regular contributor to the forum back in the day.
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/member.php?u=104835

Swashbuckler

Mellor wrote:

John was a regular contributor to the forum back in the day.

Bit of a novelty for us "newbies" though.

shanec1928

I assume the announcement will be about the UFC gyms here like he mentioned on one of his videos

Dtp1979

Swashbuckler wrote: »

Post #7075 and #7084. The man himself!!

On my phone and no posts are numbered.

Swashbuckler

Dtp1979 wrote:

On my phone and no posts are numbered.

John Kavanagh posted a few pages back.

wonderfullife

Mellor wrote: »

All fighters need sponsors. Whether Conor has helped him with his training or not doesn't change that. If he handed him $20k last week, he'd still be standing here today with a blank part of shorts and no sponsors.


Fighters looking for sponsors is really common. I've seen guys signed to the UFC making the same appeal.
If you have a look, I'd say there's definitely fighters from Eddie's team making the same appeal.


He wasn't pulled by the UFC. He decline the fight in the first place.

Luka said that he had 2 or 3 sponsors on his shorts and he had space for 1 or 2 more if anybody was interested and that it was a charity fight.

My point was simply that it would look pretty good for Conor to throw "Themaclife.com" on the shorts. For the couple of hundred euro involved and the fact that Luka has been one of his biggest sparring partners over the last few years, i thought it'd have made sense all around.

His words were "all help is more than welcome".

I'm not having a massive pop at either Conor or John or SBG ..... it's just the type of thing where i can't personally imagine having $30 or $40 million and letting a training partner go stuck for 200 quid for a charity event.

I'm sure Conor does lots behind the scenes for all the lads.

Depp

re the whole sponsor thing, yeah conor could have the whole team go out in shorts covered with maclife logos and itd probably look good for conors image but it wouldnt look that fantastic for the fighters/team in general at the same time

Edit; and when i say ''wouldnt look fantastic'', I dont mean the shorts won't look nice

wonderfullife

People tend to forget that almost all fighters get leg-ups at some point in time and all have to scratch around for help - whether it's sponsorship on shorts or otherwise.

Conor pre-UFC asked a DJ to remix a Walk-out song for him for Cage Warriors and the price was $250 to do a custom remix and Conor said he couldn't afford it "at the level i'm at" and tried to negotiate putting the DJ's website on his shorts. DJ turned him down.

I would have thought advertising TheMacLife.Com on shorts, t-shirts, sponsoring BAMMA/AFC/Cage Warriors cards is the perfect vehicle for Conor to give a little leg-up to training partners and get his business out to a wider audience. Whilst Conor is hugely famous, The Mac Life is still in its early days and the web traffic hasn't been earth shattering. 145,000 subscribers to the YouTube channel and view count on the articles is a modest success so far.

I'm sure Conor is actively reading Boards.ie looking for business advice from a broke bum like myself :pac:

nomadchocolate

Seen someone argue that Conor spent 300k on a training camp and still struggled to beat a lightweight gatekeeper in Diaz.

Their point being that Eddie will smash Conor on this basis.

wonderfullife

nomadchocolate wrote: »

Seen someone argue that Conor spent 300k on a training camp and still struggled to beat a lightweight gatekeeper in Diaz.

Their point being that Eddie will smash Conor on this basis.

You can count on one hand the amount of people who beat Nate in a convincing fashion. Even Josh Thomson who TKO'd him, it was a back-and-forth fight until he landed that head kick.

If that's the only argument for predicting Eddie is going to smash him it's a weak one.

Conversely we've a ton of evidence that Eddie gets rocked and dropped in a lot of his fights. He's been dropped 8 times in his MMA career and rocked many times. Conor has never been dropped in his entire career and the only time we've really seen him rocked was in the first Diaz fight.

If it was purely a battle of chins i'd want Conors.

Eddie could, of course, land a clean shot and KO Conor. Anything is possible in the fight game. But if we base analysis from evidence only, then there's not a whole lot of evidence to suggest Eddie has the power to switch Conors lights off.

More to the point, people comment on Eddies wrestling a lot and that's a bit ironic as he doesn't really use much wrestling in his fights. You can count on one hand the amount of single-leg and double-legs he has successfully completed in his last 10 fights.

You actually have to go back to 2009 for the last time he successfully dragged someone to the ground to get a submission win.

Call Me Jimmy

Is the reason conors boxing is so good (in MMA terms) largely to do with that being what he trained in first? I don't see people making too much of Alvarez's boxing, but didnt he start that at a young age too? And didnt he just knock out RDA? I admit I know next to **** all, but is conor not in just as much danger of getting knocked out as he is being wrestled to a finish as most seem to say eddie will do?

Think conor's going to talk like he's gonna come out swinging (like in the press conference saying first round ko) but will actually come out like the second diaz fight, much more conservative. I don't think alverez will expect that, conor letting alvarez push the pace

wonderfullife

Call Me Jimmy wrote: »

Is the reason conors boxing is so good (in MMA terms) largely to do with that being what he trained in first? I don't see people making too much of Alvarez's boxing, but didnt he start that at a young age too? And didnt he just knock out RDA? I admit I know next to **** all, but is conor not in just as much danger of getting knocked out as he is being wrestled to a finish as most seem to say eddie will do?

Think conor's going to talk like he's gonna come out swinging (like in the press conference saying first round ko) but will actually come out like the second diaz fight, much more conservative. I don't think alverez will expect that, conor letting alvarez push the pace

Conor just has excellent timing and awareness of range. You'd have to say boxing first helped him but MMA striking is a different kettle of fish. The karate stance he employs in MMA is very different than a traditional southpaw boxing stance.

Eddie isn't known for his power. If you take out the RDA fight, he's had 2 TKO 1st Round Finishes in his last 15 fights. He's not known as a Rumble Johnson or Tyron Woodley type of guy who just needs to land clean once and it's lights out.

Conor definitely has that power in his hands, specifically his left hand. If he lands that clean we've a ton of evidence to suggest Eddie will be wobbled or hitting the deck.

Mean Laqueefa

wonderfullife wrote: »

Conor just has excellent timing and awareness of range. You'd have to say boxing first helped him but MMA striking is a different kettle of fish. The karate stance he employs in MMA is very different than a traditional southpaw boxing stance.

Eddie isn't known for his power. If you take out the RDA fight, he's had 2 TKO 1st Round Finishes in his last 15 fights. He's not known as a Rumble Johnson or Tyron Woodley type of guy who just needs to land clean once and it's lights out.

Conor definitely has that power in his hands, specifically his left hand. If he lands that clean we've a ton of evidence to suggest Eddie will be wobbled or hitting the deck.

Lukker-

Call Me Jimmy wrote: »

Is the reason conors boxing is so good (in MMA terms) largely to do with that being what he trained in first? I don't see people making too much of Alvarez's boxing, but didnt he start that at a young age too? And didnt he just knock out RDA? I admit I know next to **** all, but is conor not in just as much danger of getting knocked out as he is being wrestled to a finish as most seem to say eddie will do?

Think conor's going to talk like he's gonna come out swinging (like in the press conference saying first round ko) but will actually come out like the second diaz fight, much more conservative. I don't think alverez will expect that, conor letting alvarez push the pace

He's a bit of a brawler who has relied on his wrestling to get him by in the UFC so far. He landed flush with an overhand right against RDA, his first knockout in the UFC. It was a good shot but RDA tends to plod forward with stiff head movement.

He's got decent boxing though, plenty of power if he can connect cleanly but I highly doubt Alvarez is going to be throwing too many power shots, he'd get badly countered.

Conor's striking is miles better and like with Pettis he'll respect that and try and pressure Conor onto the cage, get him in the clinch or simply take him down.

Depp

Lukker- wrote: »

He's a bit of a brawler who has relied on his wrestling to get him by in the UFC so far. He landed flush with an overhand right against RDA, his first knockout in the UFC. It was a good shot but RDA tends to plod forward with stiff head movement.

He's got decent boxing though, plenty of power if he can connect cleanly but I highly doubt Alvarez is going to be throwing too many power shots, he'd get badly countered.

Conor's striking is miles better and like with Pettis he'll respect that and try and pressure Conor onto the cage, get him in the clinch or simply take him down.

if he actually tries to stand with conor it wont be a long fight, that would be rousey-levels of inflated self confidence

Mellor

wonderfullife wrote: »

Luka said that he had 2 or 3 sponsors on his shorts and he had space for 1 or 2 more if anybody was interested and that it was a charity fight.

My point was simply that it would look pretty good for Conor to throw "Themaclife.com" on the shorts. For the couple of hundred euro involved and the fact that Luka has been one of his biggest sparring partners over the last few years, i thought it'd have made sense all around.

His words were "all help is more than welcome".

I'm not having a massive pop at either Conor or John or SBG ..... it's just the type of thing where i can't personally imagine having $30 or $40 million and letting a training partner go stuck for 200 quid for a charity event.

I'm sure Conor does lots behind the scenes for all the lads.

Maybe Conor pays him for dedicated sparring time as it is, and doesn't want to take a sponsor slot for no reason. Makes more sense to leave the slot free so somebody else can pay him

Mellor

Partially relevant, Dillion Danis wins double gold in No-Gi Pan Ams. His weight division and also Absolute (open weight)

Subcomandante Marcos

wonderfullife wrote: »

More to the point, people comment on Eddies wrestling a lot and that's a bit ironic as he doesn't really use much wrestling in his fights. You can count on one hand the amount of single-leg and double-legs he has successfully completed in his last 10 fights.

You actually have to go back to 2009 for the last time he successfully dragged someone to the ground to get a submission win.

Eddie uses his wrestling to great effect in almost every one of his fights.

Wrestling isn't just shooting doubles and getting takes downs, the clinch work against the cage, grinding your opponent down and tiring them down while still landing on the body is a big part of MMA wrestling and something wrestlers do better than anyone else. Just watch Eddie's last few fights before the RDA fight where he basically ground out wins by smothering the other guy against the cage for 15 minutes and nullified their offense.

Conor's job will be to keep his back off of the cage and stay in the centre of the octagon where he's effective, eddies job will be to try push him into the cage and wear him down.

wonderfullife

Subcomandante Marcos wrote: »

Eddie uses his wrestling to great effect in almost every one of his fights.

Wrestling isn't just shooting doubles and getting takes downs, the clinch work against the cage, grinding your opponent down and tiring them down while still landing on the body is a big part of MMA wrestling and something wrestlers do better than anyone else. Just watch Eddie's last few fights before the RDA fight where he basically ground out wins by smothering the other guy against the cage for 15 minutes and nullified their offense.

Conor's job will be to keep his back off of the cage and stay in the centre of the octagon where he's effective, eddies job will be to try push him into the cage and wear him down.

Yeah, that's the smartest plan he has - even if he denied it was his plan at the Presser!

And you're right there's more to wrestling than take-downs but you'd guess from the hype that Eddie is going to drag him to the ground repeatedly (like Mendes did) and lay on him for 5 rounds.

You'd have to fancy Eddies chances if he could turn it into an ugly, technical 5-round clinch battle pressed up against the cage.

I just don't see that happening. The magnitude of the fight and enormity of the occasion will dictate the style of fight. Eddie came out swinging against RDA and i think it'll be a similar pattern against Conor.

The Pettis-Alvarez fight was super close and a lot scored it for Pettis. And the difference between Conor and Pettis is that Conor needs far less space to get off his offence.

The key to this fight is the reach advantage Conor has. 5 inches is a sizeable advantage and he's shown time after time he is a master at utilizing height/reach advantages.

wonderfullife

Mellor wrote: »

Partially relevant, Dillion Danis wins double gold in No-Gi Pan Ams. His weight division and also Absolute (open weight)

Hopefully he'll be over in Dublin soon to train for Polaris 4 given it's on in the UK.

Mellor

wonderfullife wrote: »

You can count on one hand the amount of single-leg and double-legs he has successfully completed in his last 10 fights.

He's hit 10 takedowns in his last 3 fights.
Probably 20+ in his last 10. Not sure what the above idea is based on.

You actually have to go back to 2009 for the last time he successfully dragged someone to the ground to get a submission win.

That's true. And he choked out Josh Neer (standing) in 2010 too.
But great wrestling doesn't necessarily mean lots of submissions

CurryFlavoured

Eddie's plan will be clear - take him down and tire him out. He's not going to have much interest standing like he did against Pettis, unless he's stupid. I think Conor has a good chance of clipping him early and putting him on wobbly legs, but the worry is if he can't stop the early takedown's it could become a long and gruelling night. I hope Conor's drilling that takedown defence, if he can stop the first couple of attempts he'll have Eddie very worried.

Boom_Bap

One of the best things about McGregor is his take down defence. Nate was chipping away at that in the last fight in the last few rounds and only had success in the last minute.

Subcomandante Marcos

Boom_Bap wrote: »

One of the best things about McGregor is his take down defence. Nate was chipping away at that in the last fight in the last few rounds and only had success in the last minute.

Nate's not a take down artist.

the only time we've ever seen Conor against a hard nosed wrestler was the Mendes fight and he got taken down at will, supposed bad knee or no.

If Eddie goes for take downs, he'll get them. I think he'll be stubborn and just try stand with Conor out of pride though.

.ak

Subcomandante Marcos wrote: »

Nate's not a take down artist.

the only time we've ever seen Conor against a hard nosed wrestler was the Mendes fight and he got taken down at will, supposed bad knee or no.

If Eddie goes for take downs, he'll get them. I think he'll be stubborn and just try stand with Conor out of pride though.

The mendes fight is a great example of Conor's ground defence though. His leg work is brilliant. Anytime I watch a McGregor fight with people I always hear them scream "get out of the clinch" or "stay on your feet", but I've never seen McGregor in trouble on the ground (bar the Diaz submission which was down to the fact he was sparked)

Mendes did all the work, McGregor soaked it up and defended well, forcing Mendes to panic and go for the submission. He gassed himself, anyone who's done any wrestling knows it's the offender that tends to be less proficient with their energy, it's why so many of the top elite fighters look so good off their back.

McGregor will be happy to go on his back in the middle of the octagon. He'll want to stay off the cage tho where things could get messy for him.

Dave0301

Subcomandante Marcos wrote: »

Nate's not a take down artist.

the only time we've ever seen Conor against a hard nosed wrestler was the Mendes fight and he got taken down at will, supposed bad knee or no.

If Eddie goes for take downs, he'll get them. I think he'll be stubborn and just try stand with Conor out of pride though.

Is "taken down at will" not a bit harsh on McGregor? He did stuff three takedowns and after the last he caught Mendes and finished the fight.

At will, would imply that McGregor has zero takedown defence.