LAS VEGAS — Jose Aldo has won 18 straight fights and is the best featherweight champion in the history of MMA. But for Conor McGregor? He’s just another guy.
“I don’t feel his boxing is great,” McGregor said Friday during the fan Q&A before UFC 183 weigh-ins. “His shot selection is poor. I would classify him as an intermediate at best. I feel his kicking game is overrated really. He cannot kick high. I don’t feel there’s anything special about him. He’s just another body that moves the way they all move, that I will shut down.”
McGregor announced at the start of the Q&A that he would be fighting Aldo in the main event of UFC 189 on July 11 here at the MGM Grand. It will be the focal point of the UFC’s annual International Fight Week.
Aldo will be making his 10th featherweight title defense. McGregor has five straight wins in the UFC, four of them by knockout. The brash Irishman is coming off a second-round TKO of Dennis Siver earlier this month in Boston.
After that victory, McGregor jumped out of the Octagon and confronted Aldo, who was sitting in the front row. McGregor said after finishing Siver, he wanted to “put that energy through Jose’s chest and look him in the eyes.” McGregor was held back by security, his girlfriend and his niece, while screaming in Aldo’s face. Aldo stayed calm and simply smiled.
“It was a f*cked up scene, yeah?” McGregor said with a laugh.
McGregor, 26, was also asked about Aldo’s cardio. The champion has a tendency to fade later in fights, though that didn’t happen in Aldo’s unanimous decision win over Chad Mendes at UFC 179 in October.
“I feel he cannot his finish his dinner, let alone finish an opponent,” McGregor said. “If it goes the five rounds, which I don’t think it will, I will be more than ready. It just takes one clean connection from me and it’s done. The facts speak for themselves. So that’s the way I feel it will happen. I will go out, I will throw my shots, I will break him down bit by bit and he will break.”
One fan asked McGregor that his friends back in Guatemala are non-believers and don’t think he can knock off Aldo.
“It’s an educational process with some people,” McGregor said, adding: “They will all bow down, eventually.”
Another fan asked McGregor if he would start being humble when Aldo knocks him out. McGregor said it would never happen, that he would be the one beating Aldo.
“And then I’m going to be extra cocky thinking of you,” McGregor said to the fan.
“The Notorious” reiterated that he feels like he’s already the champion, just picking off challengers. He doesn’t think Aldo is any different than Siver or Dustin Poirier or Diego Brandao.
“This is just another man in my way,” McGregor said.