With no major UFC event this weekend, the majority of news in MMA is fully focused on UFC featherweight champion Conor McGregor, and a big part of that is his highly-publicized feud with a bevy of WWE wrestlers after he recently called them ‘p——‘ and threatened to slap them.
The threat was met with a harsh backlash by a number of high-profile WWE stars from Ric Flair to Roman Reigns to Sasha Banks, and another media windfall was stirred up by the controversial master of self-promotion.
McGregor only took that a step further by blasting perennial WWE frontrunner John Cena in yesterday’s UFC 202 media day to promote his upcoming rematch with Nate Diaz at next weekend’s (August 20, 2016) UFC 202 from Las Vegas, and one prominent former WWE champ is not impressed with the words of ‘Notorious.’
Olympic gold medalist wrestler and pro-wrestling star Kurt Angle met up with Sports Illustrated to break down the situation, noting that McGregor doesn’t know what it takes to be a full-time pro-wrestler, and so should therefore keep his mouth shut about the subject:
“Conor is either the most loved or the most hated fighter in UFC, and that’s a credit to him,” said Angle. “But to cross over into another career, into pro wrestling–something you don’t even know–and call WWE wrestlers “p——”? That’s offensive. Don’t talk about someone you don’t know.”
As for how he feels he’d do in a match-up with McGregor, Angle feels it’d be no contest, as his size advantage would lead him to an easy win:
“I’d take him down, then ground and pound him until I knocked him out,” said Angle. “Conor is a polished fighter, but with my size, I would overpower him. It wouldn’t be that difficult for me.
“Coming out of the Olympics, with the way I was training, McGregor wouldn’t have had a chance in hell,” said Angle. “I was also 230 pounds, so that’s not really fair. But pound for pound, he might be the best fighter today.”
With that extremely unlikely to ever happen, however, Angle issued a challenge of a different kind to McGregor, tasking him with taking five pro-wrestling ‘bumps’ in the squared circle:
“I’d like to challenge Conor,” said Angle. “Take five bumps with me in the ring. Just five bumps. When I did that for the first time, I took three and said, ‘F— this, I’m quitting.’ I quit for a couple days and my manager talked me into going back. I know how Dana White and Conor continue to bash the business, but I challenge either of them to get in the ring with me and take five bumps. Once they do, they’ll realize how tough it is–and that’s not even a fraction of what it takes to be a pro wrestler.”
Angle also compared MMA and pro-wrestling, noting that the WWE supposedly focuses on safety more than the UFC does. He knows it’s extremely tough to be a top-flight MMA fighter, but said it’s equally tough to be a pro-wrestler, just in a different way:
“We do rely on safety, unlike UFC fighters,” said Angle. “The pure fact is there is nothing I’ve ever done that is tougher than pro wrestling. It doesn’t make you tough from a fighting standpoint, but it does make you tough from what you have to do every day and how you have to sacrifice. They’re both very tough to do, but they’re tough in different ways.”
With McGregor blasting Cena heavily, Angle said that while he admits the longtime WWE superstar and multi-time world champ might tap out quickly in the Octagon, what he’s accomplished over the past fourteen years is simply amazing and without equal:
“John Cena would tap in twenty seconds in the Octagon, but he is still the biggest badass to ever walk the face of the earth,” said Angle. “This kid has been on top for thirteen years. No one has ever done that. He’s now in his fourteenth year on top.
“I couldn’t do it. Hulk Hogan didn’t do that, Stone Cold had four or five years tops, and it was the same with The Rock before he went to Hollywood. From a toughness standpoint, there is nobody tougher than John Cena. I would love to see Conor McGregor try to be on top of WWE for thirteen years. He wouldn’t make it.”
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