McGregor and Poirier agree to rematch, for charity

Photo by Jeff Bottari/Zuffa LLC/Zuffa LLC via Getty Images

Conor McGregor invited his former foe to a contest outside of the UFC.

Conor McGregor has been an active tweeter as of late. Last week he used the social media platform to drop screenshots of private messages between him and UFC President Dana White. White would then call that the “dirtiest thing” one could do, especially if you respect the “man code”.

McGregor fired back saying White was the one who first broke this mysterious code. After that the former UFC lightweight and featherweight champion looked to engage elsewhere on the twitter-machine.

One target he found was former fellow UFC-champ-champ Daniel Cormier. While ranting at ‘DC’, McGregor drew the attention of a man he first met way back during his rise to the top of MMA relevancy, Dustin ‘the Diamond’ Poirier.

A simple retweet of ‘Conor?’ spiraled into a plan for the pair to fight in a charity MMA match benefiting Poirier’s The Good Fight Foundation. Here are the tweets (copied in case they disappear).

“Hey bro! You want to do an MMA charity fight? Zero to do with the UFC. I will donate half a mill towards your charity for it. Sell it on ppv or work a tv deal and we work out other charities that are close to my heart also. I am engaged in many. Strictly a charity “exhibition””

“December 12th in the Point depot, Ireland. No weigh ins. Open weight, unified rules. I will arrange all travel fare for you and family. McGregor Sports and Entertainment MMA, in association with The Good Fight Foundation. Charity Mixed Martial Arts!”

“I’m in! Lets (sic) do it! A lot of people will benefit from this”

“Excellent! We shall take it offline and progress the process from here. Good man Dustin! I respect your philanthropic efforts greatly, as well as how you conducted yourself post our first fight. You have my respect!”

After their convivial back-and-forth on twitter Poirier then teased that this event might actually happen, tweeting “December 12 Circle your calendars”. He signed the tweet “#peahead” invoking an insult McGregor used on him the first time they met.

McGregor and Poirier fought a UFC 178 on September 27th, 2014 on a stacked main card that included Donald Cerrone vs. Eddie Alvarez, Cat Zingano vs. Amanda Nunes, Yoel Romero vs. Tim Kennedy and Demetrius Johnson vs. Chris Cariaso (as the headliner).

McGregor won that contest via a first round TKO, thanks to a clubbing left hand that glanced Poirier’s temple. McGregor would go on to beat Dennis Siver and Chad Mendes before ending Jose Aldo’s storied featherweight title run with a brutal 13 second KO. That win solidified McGregor as the sports biggest ever attraction.

After losing to McGregor Poirier found himself in MMA’s wilderness for a number of years before bursting back into title contention with a violent series of contests that saw him finish Anthony Pettis, Justin Gaethje and Eddie Alvarez. He then beat UFC featherweight champion Max Holloway, in a lightweight bout, to set up an ultimately unsuccessful UFC lightweight title bout with Khabib Nurmagomedov.

Poirier was last seen besting Dan Hooker in June.

Whether Poirier and McGregor tango again, outside the confines of a UFC Octagon, is heavily dependent on the notoriously restrictive contracts both men signed with ZUFFA. Those contracts give the UFC exclusive rights to MMA contests involving either fighter. An argument over whether that extends to ‘charity’ or ‘exhibition’ bouts, in this context, is one the UFC would likely fight tooth and nail over.