Conor McGregor Is Like ‘A Young Muhammad Ali,’ Demetrious Johnson Says

Demetrious Johnson has a reputation as someone who has a difficult time hyping his own fights. Apparently, he does much better when he’s hyping another fighter, especially a fighter with lots of of hype skills.
In other words, the UFC flyweight champio…

Demetrious Johnson has a reputation as someone who has a difficult time hyping his own fights. Apparently, he does much better when he’s hyping another fighter, especially a fighter with lots of of hype skills.

In other words, the UFC flyweight champion was enthusiastically hyping the hypers Monday on The MMA Hour broadcast with host Ariel Helwani. One in particular has apparently caught the champ’s fancy: Conor McGregor, the fast-talking Irishman who has taken the featherweight division by storm and is presently in full squawk mode for his bout this Saturday with Dustin Poirier at UFC 178.

Johnson will defend his belt in the main event of that card against heavy underdog Chris Cariaso. But on Monday, he got just as excited about McGregor‘s contest as he did his own.

“He reminds me of a young Mike Tyson, a young Muhammad Ali, the way he talks,” Johnson said on the broadcast. “I look at him and I don’t see him talking trash. I look at him and I see him talking what he sees, like, ‘Dude, I’m way faster, I move way better than you do, you’re slow, I’m going to hit you hard.'”

The comparison to Ali essentially flowed from the fact that Johnson sees McGregor as more brash than arrogant, someone who makes the smack as factual as it is fun.

“I can appreciate somebody who can talk that stuff and then go in there and back it up,” Johnson said.

In any case, it was humorous and more than a bit interesting to hear Johnson express such admiration for another fighter’s mic skills. Johnson, the only man to ever hold the UFC’s flyweight title, is undeniably skilled in the cage but tends to measure out his sound bites in coffee spoons. Not exactly the best way to get fans excited for your fight, even if the vague theme of respecting one’s opponent is somewhat admirable nonetheless.

McGregor does not have any of these problems. He said in an interview that he believes Poirier to be a “basic” fighter with a “journeyman” status in the promotion, per Mike Bohn of MMA Junkie.

Poirier is, of course, the fifth-ranked featherweight in the UFC right now (McGregor is ninth) and has won three straight. So McGregor certainly is not shying away from his usual big talk as UFC 178 approaches.

 

Read more MMA news on BleacherReport.com