Photo by Hans Gutknecht/Digital First Media/Los Angeles Daily News via Getty Images
Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) lightweight champion, Khabib Nurmagomedov, may not be fighting Conor McGregor in this weekend’s UFC 242 pay-per-view (PPV)main event from Abu Dhabi, but “The Eagle” is still hoping “Notorious” can help sell his upcoming bout.
That’s because Nurmagomedov’s showdown opposite newly-crowned interim lightweight champion, Dustin Poirier, has little-to-no hype (says this guy), which can happen when both fighters are respectful of the other and don’t have much trash to talk. Unexciting? Maybe. Refreshing? Absolutely.
Besides, I’d rather save the drama for inside the cage, which seemed to be lacking when Nurmagomedov and McGregor went to war at UFC 229 last October in Las Vegas. Their championship affair was pretty one-sided until “The Eagle” secured the choke midway through the fourth frame.
The real fireworks didn’t get started until after the fight, courtesy of Dillon Danis and the Dagestani goon squad. Not surprisingly, the promotion opted to omit that purse-pinching footage from the main event replay embedded above, but something tells me we haven’t heard the last of that silliness.
For much more on UFC 242 click here.