Midnight Mania! Check Out Birthday Sculpture by McGregor’s ‘Soulmate’

Bringing you the weird and wild from the world of MMA each and every weeknight

Welcome to Midnight Mania!

Every weeknight I sit down wondering if what strange and juicy morsel the stew of MMA has had simmering under the surface for me, and seemingly every weeknight I am not disappointed. But tonight’s story, while somehow not unprecedented — there is a whole genre of weird artists depicting equally weird MMA fighters, sometimes with a weird relationship between them; it isn’t even the first sculpture made of McGregor himself — still managed to raise my eyebrows a little.

See, originally I thought, that’s just what you do on your 30th birthday if you are one Conor McGregor; you commission a 50,000 pound sterling sculpture of your visage by a famous artist. Hey, it’s no crazier than anything else McGregor has done, or anything else very rich people do for that matter.

But this statue wasn’t commissioned by McGregor at all. The artist, Edgar Askelovic, also known as Aspencrow, just… made it as a gift. According to the BBC via MMAJunkie.com:

“It is an honour Conor has accepted this as a gift from me,” said the Vilnius-born, Birmingham-based artist.

”He is a phenomenon of our time – not just a smart athlete, but also a visionary.”

That’s not even the strangest part. But before we get to that, Aspencrow wants us all to know this is very normal. And there is, as I have said, precedent, with athletes like Mark Hunt and Israel Adesanya, among others, serving as muses for artists and fashion designers. But the thing is… he hasn’t ever met McGregor.

“I think he’s a phenomenon,” he went on. “It’s normal that someone decided to immortalise him in this way.”

Aspencrow admitted he had neither met nor spoken to McGregor directly, communicating instead via one of the fighter’s friends.

”That’s how I got the information that he knows about the sculpture, and that he accepts it,” he told the BBC.

So McGregor accepts the gift. It’s not clear whether he accepts how Aspencrow feels about him.

“It’s up to you what you see in it,” said the artist. “You can see him as a prisoner, or a God, or just as a person.

(Just a person, thank you)

”I like Conor McGregor – he’s a great guy,” Aspencrow continued. “I feel he’s my soulmate.

Okay then.

”Some of the decisions he makes might not be correct, but none of us are ideal.”

I’m glad Aspencrow has some perspective here. That is important between soulmates.

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Insomnia

The only other simultaneous two division champion in UFC history, Daniel Cormier, is also sculpted from marble

This is actually pretty cool

This very long video examines footage of Bruce Lee TKOing a karate guy with what could really either be a body shot or a nut shot. It seems a little silly now but that’s where the martial arts/combat sports world was at the time.

UFC 226 prelims did not knock it out of the park, which is a shame because they were pretty awesome, especially Urijah Hall vs. Paulo Costa.

It will never stop being odd to me seeing humans who play basketball just built to an entirely different scale than normal UFC athletes like Donald Cerrone

Anthony Pettis, fresh off his 350,000 dollar win, is already back in the gym.

This is some seriously cringe-worthy trash talk from Derek Brunson and Israel Adesanya.

Mike Perry still can’t get any respect from the people that matter most in life — lazy river pool managers.

Carlos Condit sparring with Siyar Bahadurzada

It seems a lot of MMA meme pages on Instagram are getting shut down by copyright claims.

Urijah Faber enjoyed this video of a guy biting off more than he could chew

Poor Darren Elkins. No respect.

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Quick Hits

• It’s pretty messed up that Brian Ortega, who lost a championship fight through no fault of his own, isn’t getting a penny (yet) from the UFC for showing up to do his job. Hopefully he can iron things out after White seemed pissed he (intelligently) wouldn’t accept a last minute replacement in the hard-hitting Jeremy Stephens because he’s not a yes man.
• I am 100% on board for Yoel Romero vs. Daniel Cormier at light heavyweight. Let’s have fun. Dad bod vs. impossible bod, Olympian vs. Olympic silver medalist.

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Slips, Rips, and KO Clips

The Tuesday night contender series got a little wild tonight

Classic southpaw combination

What a combination

Mike Perry vs. Paul Felder is a fight I need to rewatch ASAP.

SUMO!!!!!

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Podcasts and Video

In case you want to relive the weekend! Follow MMA Mania on Youtube

Junior Dos Santos has one particularly dangerous punch: his overhand right. Team Alpha Male’s Andrew Richardson and Andrew Coyne break it down:

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Random Land

“We don’t do that here”

Hey look it’s my job description

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