Aldo: McGregor ‘a normal, quiet guy’
Aldo says that, during the promo tour for UFC 189, he got to see a different side of McGregor, contradicting his many complaints about McGregor’s conduct in the past.
[The relationship] is friendly, quiet. For me, I see no problem with him doing his marketing, and seeing the financial side, it was very good. If I had more fights with him in the featherweight division, it would be very profitable, but I am not his friend, he can go one way and I go to the other. I’ve seen him stand facing the wall, staring at nothing and everyone trying to provoke him, and he has a glazed look. He’s a normal, quiet guy, but if you see a camera or an Irish person close, he turns. Outside you see him laughing, joking, talking usual — but then he turns in such a way that you think: ‘son of a bitch’…Sometimes you play jokes and he is laughing. There was one day we sat and he said to get coffee, and I said I wanted sugar, and he answered like: ‘good’. I met him recently at a hotel, he was eating breakfast and I said I wanted barbecue, he said it was his breakfast, of course. But most of the time we met, there was always someone [with a camera] shooting, so he had to keep it up. But with no camera, the face changes completely.
‘I’m gonna blow up Call of Duty’
McGregor is interviewed about Call of Duty.
We’re gonna break the record this year with Call of Duty…Of course I’m a fan..I’m in the new game!
‘A lot of feelings were hurt’ by McGregor’s insults
On a UFC 203 media conference call CM Punk says that, while he doesn’t care what McGregor said, it hurt other WWE wrestler’s feelings.
A lot of feelings were hurt, though, I can tell you that much, which I thought was a little strange. You’ve gotta leave the emotion out of it. These guys still don’t know…It’s a hard thing to comment on, because the amount of people who responded to him made me feel like they were told to respond to him. [McGregor is] the biggest name in sports at the moment. There’s always grey areas when you involve that whole scene and you’re wondering, is this a work, is this not a work?
Bisping: Alvarez would kill McGregor
Bisping says that McGregor cannot beat Alvarez at 155 pounds, disagreeing with John Kavanagh, who has said McGregor would beat Alvarez inside two rounds.
I think looking at that last fight, he does not want to fight Eddie Alvarez at 155. I think Alvarez kills him man. He’ll just take him down and destroy him. I’m not saying that to be mean, I just think stylistically…I like Conor. Conor is incredible, he’s done amazing things for this sport. He’s brought so many eyes on to it, he’s making so much money and he’s exciting as hell. He brings excitement.
Open to McGregor boxing match
Alvarez says he is open to meeting McGregor is the boxing ring, and criticises his comments about boxers.
I’ve been fighting the best since I was 23, since a very young age, that’s the last thing he could ever speak about me or say about me, but I understand, there’s people out there that like to talk nonsense and stupidity. If he wants to try out boxing, then anytime he wants. If he wants to come over to this side of the world and try boxing, anytime he wants, to see that it’s not as easy as he thinks,
British GP ‘uncertain’
Rossi talks about the upcoming British GP at Silverstone,
I have very nice recent memories of Silverstone. Last year I won a really incredible race in very difficult conditions. I hope that this year there will be nice weather, but from the climatic point of view the English race is very uncertain. I like Silverstone a lot, it’s a very fun track but also very demanding. This circuit is very long and there are many changes of direction with high speeds. It is important to find a perfect set-up for the bike to be able to suit both the slow and the fast corners. We will try to work on all aspects, as we have been doing the entire season to get the best possible result.
Henry disses Kavanagh
In reply to a screenshot of an article where Kavanagh said he’d prefer for McGregor to go to 155lb and fight Alvarez for the lightweight championship, and in addition predicted a second round knockout, Henry says:
John Kavanagh, for a jiu-jitsu coach who can’t event teach his student Conor McGregor how to tie his belt and just got subbed quick you have a lot to say. PS give the proceeds of your book to the striking coach, he deserves it.
Kavanagh responds:
it won't. I'll focus on my fighter. I'm not a fighter and I'm not interested in headlines, I'm just a coach doing my best.
— Coach JK (@John_Kavanagh) August 30, 2016
Wants to buy $2m watch
McGregor says he wants to buy a $2 million Richard Milles watch to add to his collection. Mille’s RM 056 costs $1.65 million, while the RM 56-02 Tourbillon Sapphire is $2 million.
I have a nice collection now. I have some Audemars. I have some Hublots. I have some Rolexes. I’ve been looking at Richard Milles. They’re a big purchase, the Richard Milles, so I’m not going to jump into it. I have the 50-year anniversary Rolex with the green face. It’s a beautiful piece. I was looking around to see if Lorenzo (UFC CEO Lorenzo Fertitta) has the same watch as me; I think he was copying me. Every time I see him, he has a new watch. I took a picture of the money-green Rolex and he said, ‘That’s my new favourite.’ And then at UFC 200 he shows up, ‘Hey look,’ and he had the same watch as me…Watches have always been something that just appeal to me. There’s something about having a really nice, quality watch on your wrist. Especially on my left wrist. When I feel the weight of it, I feel like… it takes you back to the caveman days, when you’d kill an animal and you would take something and put it around your neck as a symbol of what we have done. ‘We have conquered this.’ When I have won a big fight and collect a big check, I’ll purchase a beautiful watch and I’ll put it on my left hand. My left hand that I have cracked on my opponent. That hand has got me my fill. It feels like I’ve earned it.
Schaub: McGregor should fight Mayweather next
Schaub says that McGregor should fight Mayweather next.
I don’t know if he’s favourite in any of those fights beside the Aldo one. I’ll tell you what to do and what he’s gonna do; you fight Floyd Mayweather for $30m, and you keep the UFC on ice because you’re the biggest star. From what I hear from inside sources – the only reason they didn’t fight before. . .they had a venue, the teams agreed to it, it was a money issue between them. I think it’s a huge opportunity for the UFC because you’re never gonna have another Conor McGregor.
Rogan: McGregor should fight Nick Diaz
Rogan says McGregor should fight Nick Diaz next
[Welterweight’s] where the money is. It would be amazing. Nick’s on a totally different level [of smack talking]. Nate’s a great fighter and a really tough guy, but even he said after the fight: ‘Shoutout to my brother – the best fighter in the world’. It would be a different experience in there. I want to see that more than anything in life. More than the Aurora Borealis, more than I want to go to Keck Observatory in Hawaii and see the Milky Way.
White: McGregor won’t be stripped of title
White says that McGregor will not be stripped of his 145-pound belt.
He’s not gonna get stripped. He’s gonna make a decision. He knows that the Nate Diaz fight isn’t the fight to make right now. He has to either defend his title or give it up and decide what he wants to do next.
He also says he is satisfied with McGregor-Diaz at UFC 202:
Think about this, Pacquiao-Mayweather, the build up for that fight, everything else. That fight didn’t live up to the hype and I think, more importantly, it left a really bad taste in people’s mouths. I don’t think that was the case for Diaz-McGregor [2]. With the amount of people that were pulled in to watch that fight, everybody left satisfied and those are the kind of fights that make you want to come back and watch again.
Dos Anjos: ‘I just saw two sloppy guys’
Dos Anjos says the UFC 202 fight with McGregor and Diaz was ‘sloppy’. He also rates the fight as a win for Diaz.
Most of the people [celebrating the fight] watched MMA for the first time that day. I just saw two sloppy guys after the second round. The fight got so sloppy. I didn’t see the best fight of all time at all. The first round was good. Conor dropped Nate a couple times, but I didn’t think ‘what an exciting fight.’ I’ve seen better fights. [I don’t agree with the majority decision,] I scored it for Nate.
Germany: Facebook should take initiative to remove racist, violent content
Germany’s interior minister visits Facebook’s offices in Berlin and said it should be more proactive in removing forbidden content from its social network platform. The German government has been critical of Facebook in the past. Political leaders and regulators have complained the world’s largest social network, with 1.6 billion monthly users, had been slow to respond to hate speech and anti-immigrant messages. De Maizier:
Facebook should take down racist content or calls for violence from its pages on its own initiative even if it hasn’t yet received a complaint.
Orders 8-10 custom suits each media tour
McGregor’s stylist says he orders 8 to 10 custom outfits every single time he goes out on a media tour, with each suit costing from $4,000 to $10,000.
From the suits down to the bow ties to the cuff links, he’s wearing David August. Every outfit I make for him takes 60 hours. He likes to wear his suits high and tight and really tailored, and his size changes all the time depending on his fights. So we’re always measuring him to make sure it fits exactly how he wants it. He’s such a style guy … he’s always been that way since the day I met him. He takes everything and makes it his own. It takes a guy with the right mind to pull off these extreme looks, and he does…We also have 2 or 3 extra outfits on hand in case anything happens to the outfits he’s supposed to wear for an event.
Bisping: ‘I inspire McGregor’
Bisping says McGregor would not be the star he is today without his influence.
No, why would Conor McGregor motivate me? I motivate Conor McGregor. When Conor McGregor was learning to stand to throw his first punch, I was kicking ass in the UFC. I’ve been at this a lot longer, so I motivate Conor McGregor. I inspire him…If it wasn’t for me, he wouldn’t exist. He would be working for minimum wage at the docks in Dublin…Put it like this, let’s have it right. Conor McGregor comes up to my waist and he weighs about the same as my little finger, so I’d snap his neck like a twig…But, he’s a cool guy. He’s a great fighter. He brings a lot of excitement. He’s been great for the sport. He brings a lot of eyes. Listen, he’s very watchable, he’s very sellable. He brings a lot of excitement and he delivers, I’m a fan.
Cowherd: UFC 202 was a ‘nail in the coffin’ of boxing
Cowheard says that UFC is killing boxing.
[UFC 202] was basically, metaphorically, a nail in the coffin of boxing. And all these boxing fans were lining up saying, ‘You don’t get it! You don’t get it!’…UFC is talked about all the time…There are certain people who are purists. Newspapers and boxing still can still make money, but they are dead industries walking. UFC is now the water cooler sport in America when it comes to mano-a-mano fighting. It is taking over boxing. Occasionally, every three years, you will have a pay-per-view with boxing, and it pops. Every three years. UFC is every other weekend.
White: Rousey will eclipse McGregor
White says Rousey’s return will topple all UFC pay-per-view records set by McGregor, including his UFC 196 fight with Nate Diaz that raked in 1.5 million PPV buys and an estimated million-plus buys estimated for UFC 202.
I think that Ronda Rousey’s return will be the biggest pay-per-view we’ve ever done…If you had told me 15 years ago that women would be fighting in the UFC – and if you told me that women would be as technically sound as the men and the fights would be loved by millions of people all over the world and it’d be the hottest thing going on in the UFC – I would have never believed it.
Kavanagh: McGregor should fight Alvarez next
Kavanagh says he would like to see McGregor challenge Alvarez for the lightweight title.
1 – dont know whats next. decision made over the next 2 weeks i'd imagine. personally i'd like 55 title….but we'll see what happens.
— Coach JK (@John_Kavanagh) August 24, 2016
2 – leg is fine. in theory could be ready for NY BUT nothing definite, see tweet no.1
— Coach JK (@John_Kavanagh) August 24, 2016
Diaz: ‘I’m coming for you’
Diaz says he wants to fight McGregor again.
By this time last fight I had already accepted (the) rematch. Rest up, I’m coming for you.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BJey-WWjSE2/
Wants to race new chassis, swingarm
Rossi says he wants to race with a new Yamaha chassis and swingarm following 60 test laps (equivalent to four race lengths) at Brno.
In the end it was a good day. This morning everybody was a little bit sad because the condition of the track look quite bad. And when I entered the track – we decided to go anyway because we had some important things to test – the lap time was quite high. But after, when 4-5-8 bikes were on track, it cleaned and for the last two hours it was a very good test. A very good level. Because we can push, go fast. Also the time attack at the end was not so bad. But especially I like the new stuff. We tried a lot of different things, especially a different chassis and different swingarm. And I like. The feeling with the bike improved and I can enter the corner faster. I also like the bike in braking.