Between UFC 176’s Aldo vs. Mendes, UFC 175’s Weidman vs. Machida, UFC 171’s Hendricks vs. Lawler and UFC Fight Night 40’s Brown vs. Silva, 2014 was a pretty good year to watch fights.
Still in its early goings, the succeeding year has struggl…
Between UFC 176’s Aldo vs. Mendes, UFC 175’s Weidman vs. Machida, UFC 171’s Hendricks vs. Lawler and UFC Fight Night 40’s Brown vs. Silva, 2014 was a pretty good year to watch fights.
Still in its early goings, the succeeding year has struggled to provide the same quality.
Bitter rivals took center stage to welcome 2015, as UFC light heavyweight champion Jon Jones and former Olympian Daniel Cormier finally had it out in the Octagon. Outside of that monumental light heavyweight tilt, the UFC has found itself working hard to provide viewers with star power at both ends of the cage while providing a back-and-forth bout.
Gustafsson vs. Johnson couldn’t do it, Silva vs. Diaz couldn’t do it and—shocking as it was—Pettis vs. dos Anjos couldn’t do it.
Stay with us as we power rank the five best UFC fights currently on the books for 2015. Fights are ranked based on the amount of hype behind the matchup and how competitive it could turn out to be.
A mere…four months out from their featherweight title tilt at UFC 189, Jose Aldo and Conor McGregor are already being given the insult-laden media tour treatment. They’ve already received their own Embedded series, lobbed steroid accusations at each other in various interviews, and most recently, engaged in a bilingual bro-down on Fox Sports Live. It’s kind of unprecedented, really.
You can check out the entire cringeworthy interview above, which features such highlights as McGregor claiming to be aroused by the “beautiful aroma” of fear that Aldo is secreting (gross), or Aldo comparing Mcgregor to Scooby Doo (lol!). Honestly, it’s pretty difficult to watch two guys throw shade at one another when a translator is involved, but McGregor is the kind of cat who could sell a ketchup popsicle to a woman in white gloves, ya dig?
Meanwhile…Demetrious Johnson sits at home playing Xbox and wondering when the damn camera crews are going to arrive already. đ
After the jump: The first three (or as McGregor would say, “tree”) episodes of the aforementioned Embedded series.
A mere…four months out from their featherweight title tilt at UFC 189, Jose Aldo and Conor McGregor are already being given the insult-laden media tour treatment. They’ve already received their own Embedded series, lobbed steroid accusations at each other in various interviews, and most recently, engaged in a bilingual bro-down on Fox Sports Live. The treatment their fight is receiving is kind of unprecedented, really, especially this far out from the actual fight.
You can check out the entire cringeworthy interview above, which features such highlights as McGregor claiming to be aroused by the “beautiful aroma” of fear that Aldo is secreting (gross), or Aldo comparing Mcgregor to Scooby Doo (lol!). Honestly, it’s pretty difficult to watch two guys throw shade at one another when a translator is involved, but McGregor is the kind of cat who could sell a ketchup popsicle to a woman in white gloves, ya dig?
Meanwhile…Demetrious Johnson sits at home playing Xbox and wondering when the damn camera crews are going to arrive already.
After the jump: The first three (or as McGregor would say, “tree”) episodes of the aforementioned Embedded series.
Conor McGregor is booked to fight one of the most fearsome fighters on the UFC roster on July 11 at UFC 189. He will face 25-1 featherweight champion Jose Aldo.
But he’s already planning future moves.
Speaking with the press during the ongo…
Conor McGregor is booked to fight one of the most fearsome fighters on the UFC roster on July 11 at UFC 189. He will face 25-1 featherweight champion Jose Aldo.
But he’s already planning future moves.
Speaking with the press during the ongoing UFC 189 World Championship Tour, McGregor said he can make the move to lightweight—and beyond—immediately.
“To be honest, I would go up [now]. I’ve campaigned for many lightweight fights since I’ve been in the UFC,” McGregor said. “If it presents itself, I’ll take it. I’ve fought in multiple weight divisions before. I have no problem going right up to welterweight.”
However, should he defeat Aldo at UFC 189, McGregor admits there will be a slight hurdle in his quest to conquer multiple divisions. He’ll be the featherweight champion, and he may have to stick around to defend his belt.
“Obviously, with the belt on the line it’s a little bit different,” McGregor said. “Because it’s the belt now. They don’t just allow you to move freely. So we’ll see.”
McGregor then mentioned that he almost convinced the UFC brass to give him the UFC 180 showdown against Diego Sanchez he so desperately desired.
However, UFC President Dana White shot that idea down, favoring to work toward the bigger picture that is currently unfolding in McGregor’s career.
While the Irishman has talked the talk and walked the walk so far in his MMA career, I’m personally not a huge fan of the lightweight and welterweight discussions.
He’s fighting Aldo in July, and as six UFC opponents have found out the hard way, getting past the Brazilian is a daunting and nearly impossible task.
While McGregor boasts the sharpest stand-up skills Aldo has faced so far, there’s no doubt the champ is on an entirely different level than the Dennis Sivers and Dustin Poiriers of the world.
Beyond Aldo, the lightweight division is packed with talent, boasting arguably the deepest roster of any class in the UFC. McGregor would have his hands full with any top-10 lightweight and even some outside that rank.
While it’s fun to consider McGregor becoming a three-division star for the UFC, the talk is a little premature until he proves he can handle the man right in front of him.
UFC featherweight champion Jose Aldo has accused Conor McGregor, his outspoken opponent at UFC 189, of taking performance-enhancing drugs.
The usually reserved Brazilian’s comments come as a retaliation to McGregor’s usual pre-fight trash talk.
The Iri…
UFC featherweight champion Jose Aldo has accused ConorMcGregor, his outspoken opponent at UFC 189, of taking performance-enhancing drugs.
The usually reserved Brazilian’s comments come as a retaliation to McGregor‘s usual pre-fight trash talk.
The Irishman recently suggested most Brazilian fighters are guilty of taking illegal substances, something Aldo retorted by insisting on increased drug testing before his July 11 Las Vegas battle with the Notorious one, reported by Matt Erickson and Rick Lee of MMA Junkie:
He’s the one that’s taking substances. There’s no surprise why he fights in this weight class. In his country, they don’t even have a commission to put rules on it. Something that I’m going to do, I’m going to ask for doping tests to be given (to McGregor) every single week, and I’m here to be tested to prove that (I’m clean).
McGregor previously appeared to take a dig at Brazilian fighters, including Anderson Silva and Cristiane Justino, both of whom have failed drug tests in recent times.
This is “Brazilian culture,” McGregor said, adding, “The women are on it, the men are on it; I don’t know what to think. I don’t have to think. (The fight) is in Vegas. We’re in a new age. The sport is being cleaned.”
The UFC recently revealed huge changes in its bid to tackle doping, reported by Brett Okamoto of ESPN.com. This includes a multimillion-dollar initiative to ensure its entire roster is subject to year-round testing.
Random drug testing carried out by an outside agency will also be used. It was perhaps symbolic this announcement came shortly after Silva—one of the sport’s biggest-ever stars—tested positive before and after his fight with Nick Diaz.
Interestingly, Aldo previously suggested he doesn’t care if his opponents are doping. “If an athlete uses something or not, I don’t see any problem,” he said during an interview with Globo’s Combate (h/t Zane Simon and Fernando Arbex of Bloody Elbow). “I’m not going to crucify the guy if he is or isn’t doped. That changes nothing to me. The same punch that hits a clean face hits a doped one.”
Aldo did however suggest “it’s wrong when you try to gain an advantage over (someone) who is clean.” The 28-year-old’s contradictory views aren’t shared by many, including UFC women’s bantamweight champion Ronda Rousey, noted during her interview with Fox Sports 1:
It’s perhaps beneficial not to take Aldo and McGregor‘s comments at face value. Both are trying to get into each other’s heads by discussing such a serious subject. McGregor is used to making this amount of noise and is likely to ramp up the intensity of his put-downs as the fight approaches.
He showed this during a recent interview alongside Aldo on Fox Sports 1:
McGregor was also seen taunting his upcoming foe with the championship belt, reported by the Daily Mail:
Aldo is currently a slight favourite to take the victory, per Oddschecker.com. The more he engages with McGregor, however, the more likely he is to lose focus on the difficult task at hand.
Since losing to Joseph Duffy via submission during his time in the Cage Warriors Fighting Championship, McGregor has won 11 of his 13 fights by knockout/TKO (he won via decision and submission in the other two).
He is fearless, ambitious and intelligent. Luring Aldo into the trash-talking game is step one on the road to taking his belt.
We can expect plenty of further exchanges between the pair in the coming months. The Vegas encounter could be a watershed moment for McGregor‘s UFC career, taking him to new heights in the organisation.
For Aldo, he’ll be hoping to brush the wily Irishman away like he did with Chad Mendes, Frankie Edgar and a host of others.
To hear him tell it, Jose Aldo could not be more at ease with the hype and trash talk spewing from the bearded jowls of his UFC 189 opponent, Conor McGregor.
The UFC featherweight champ recently spoke with members of the media in Las Vegas during…
To hear him tell it, Jose Aldo could not be more at ease with the hype and trash talk spewing from the bearded jowls of his UFC 189 opponent, ConorMcGregor.
The UFC featherweight champ recently spoke with members of the media in Las Vegas during a promotional tour to hype the July 11 main event, and he sounded off on McGregor and how he sees his next challenge playing out inside the UFC Octagon.
While some may feel McGregor, with his showy, over-the-top antics, is getting in Aldo’s head, the champ sees things differently. That’s not the case.
In fact, the opposite is true.
“I was never upset (with everything McGregor said),” Aldo told the media. “I just laughed at it. … My mind is my strongest weapon. It’s hard to get into my mind. … Face-offs mean nothing. I’m in his head and he knows what’s coming.
“He asked me to look into his eyes and I did. I saw how he is. I’ve studied him, I know all his movements. I already know what to do in there.”
McGregor‘s showmanship and bravado, Aldo predicts, will be his downfall when the two enter the cage.
One of Aldo’s previous opponents, Cub Swanson, spit vitriol before their WEC 41 encounter, and the words only focused Aldo’s anger and energy.
The result was devastating.
Eight seconds into the fight, Swanson was on the mat in the fetal position, collapsed by a rare double flying knee courtesy of the Brazilian.
“It’s going to be the same thing with this one,” Aldo said.
In one respect, though, Aldo recognizes what McGregor is doing. As a veteran of over 10 years, he understands the fight game and the promotional machine behind it.
While he admits selling fights is not something he enjoys doing, he recognizes it as a necessary evil in the fight business.
And he cut a Joe Namath-style promo for the press in Las Vegas to illustrate that fact.
“I usually don’t say how I’m going to win, but I can guarantee you I’m going to win,” Aldo said.
Aldo certainly seems relaxed, confident and clear-headed going into his UFC 189 showdown, and that might spell doom for the brash Irishman when the lights go down in Vegas.
What do you think? Is Aldo’s talk just that—talk? Is McGregor in his head?
Who has the upper hand here?
Sound off, and we’ll discuss this marquee featherweight showdown.
Conor McGregor is booked to fight one of the most fearsome fighters on the UFC roster on July 11 at