Madison Square Masterpiece
Conor McGregor completes a picture he began painting years ago.
On the last day of 2012, an Irishman in his hometown achieved what to many would feel like a completed dream. His dazzling kicks and invulnerable aura captivated the crowd, but it was his tried-and-true counter-left that separated his opponent from consciousness and landed the second gold belt on his shoulder. The Cage Warriors featherweight and lightweight champion, Conor McGregor became the first European to hold two belts consecutively in a mixed-martial-arts organization. Capturing the attention of the big leagues, he bid the European circuit farewell and said goodbye to his two belts. On his way into the UFC, he collected his last social welfare check.
Less than four years later, that stubborn Dublin dreamer sits perched atop a cage, a gold belt on each shoulder and millions in his bank account, in the most historic fighting venue in the world. The building where Sugar Ray Robinson won his first war with Jake LaMotta, where Rocky Marciano broke down in tears after knocking out his idol Joe Louis. The ghosts of Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier linger, immortalized in the walls of Madison Square Garden, forty-five years removed from The Fight of the Century.
It is a peculiar and perhaps futile thing, attempting to reflect on history as it unfolds before us. In fear of overstatement we shy away from hyperbole, we mention the caveats, we choose to focus on the hurdles that lie ahead.
Because of Conor McGregor’s unchanged belief in his own greatness, his steadfast conviction that his peers are beneath him, detractors refused to remove the asterisk they attached to his triumphs. When the scrappy Irish southpaw entered the UFC and vowed to replicate his dual-champion status, they waited for his humbling moment. When he set a handful of featherweights ablaze on his way to the title, they pointed to the challenges he’d avoided. When he earned his first UFC title, they blamed his opponent’s preparation and labeled his interim belt a shiny prop. When he knocked out the best fighter in the world, they gave him credit — but still the asterisk remained. Immediately he aimed not ahead but upward, seeking to dethrone another champion rather than defend his current status.
When McGregor stepped into the cage with lightweight champion Eddie Alvarez in Madison Square Garden, many focused on the nauseating issue of merit: Did McGregor deserve this opportunity, or was his star power granting him chances that he hadn’t earned in the cage? To the man himself, such critics were little more than grounded blurs he refused to squint at from his spot in the sky.
“Winners focus on winning, losers focus on winners,” McGregor said ahead of the contest. “They’re focusing on me. I’m focusing on history.” Blunt words, but no mantra better encapsulates the path that he’s taken to cement his name in fighting history. When every ounce of you believes, however arrogantly, that your peers are beneath you, there’s nowhere to look but up.
McGregor’s first fight of 2016 was the most important one of his life. In March, he entered the UFC 196 main event with an ego that reflected the druglord-praising song that followed him into the arena — “I am the god…El Chapo…I am the god” — and he couldn’t leave that conceit outside the cage. From the opening bell he swung, spun, charged, jumped, cursed…and within minutes his punches came slower and shorter, his sadistic grin as his shots ricocheted off Nate Diaz’s chin giving way to blank concern that the Stockton brawler was still there. He was a machine-gunner with an empty clip, continuing to pull the trigger.
Diaz-McGregor II was a vanity project, the case of McGregor using his leverage to erase the March defeat, the only blemish on his UFC record. Nonetheless, the August rematch demonstrated that the Irishman learned a skill more essential than his left-hand piston — the ability to adapt. His looping uppercuts were gone, replaced by the snapping jab. The spinning kicks that did little but prove athleticism and drain the gas tank took a back seat to purposeful chops at Diaz’s lazy lead leg. When McGregor’s energy dipped once again, he chose to relax and counter rather than spray and pray. Once again, the Stocktonite survived the Irishman’s shots and made him appear human. But for McGregor, learning that he was human was worth the loss of the mystique he’d worn at featherweight.
Ahead of UFC 205, McGregor reverted back to his uber-confident schtick, and many questioned if he had forgotten his lesson. He predicted a first-round knockout, declared Alvarez a novice, instigated backstage faceoffs, regarded the division’s top contenders with contempt for even being mentioned alongside him. Perhaps, some wondered, he was in for another rude awakening.
Before McGregor landed a single strike, he reminded the world watching of his most special gift: his refusal to acknowledge the weight of the moment until it had ended, the ability to fight truly in the present. He had indeed retained the wisdom he took from the Diaz detour — it was evident in his economical movement, his steely focus on Alvarez’s every ill-fated twitch, the absence of any dazzling but ineffective attack.
With the fat trimmed from McGregor’s arsenal, he put on a showcase of counter-striking genius. For his entire career, the European striker’s grappling was said to be a hole in his game that the American wrestler would expose. Not nearly enough attention was paid to the gap in boxing ability between McGregor and such takedown artists. Much of the sport is made up of wrestlers and jiu-jitsu practitioners who developed the striking skills along the way. Against McGregor, what is serviceable against most opponents appears, as the Irishman predicted, novice.
A minute into the fight, McGregor slipped Alvarez’s lazy right cross and fired back with a left-right-left combination so fast it could have been a single strike if not for the multiple jolts of the champion’s head. The tough veteran that he is, Alvarez survived being dropped but it mattered little. After a single exchange the champion appeared lost, frozen, his multitude of skills reduced to a sliver of a puncher’s chance.
A round and a few more knockdowns later, McGregor stood in the center of the cage, stared at his outmatched opponent, and placed his hands behind his back. Unlike the dangerous toying that eventually caught up to Anderson Silva, the gesture was done in a measured dose and served a purpose beyond showboating: it told Alvarez just how outmatched he was. (McGregor would later add that he had practiced the move in training to protect a sore right hand). McGregor was no more in danger with his hands behind his back than he was with a raised guard, and the swelling defeat painted on Alvarez’s face said he knew it.
Before the contest, Alvarez criticized McGregor’s conditioning, saying he was only effective for roughly eight minutes. Unlike the champion’s other critiques, this one didn’t have time to be proven false. Eight minutes into the contest, a four-punch mauling sent Alvarez to the canvas for the last time.
The curse of the showman is that he is always faced with the task of topping himself. McGregor’s early run in the UFC was filled with such poetic pre-fight verbal assaults that some of his recent boastings seemed stale by comparison. But in the mecca of boxing where legends have made their names, McGregor the fighter unveiled his signature masterpiece.
His story does remain largely untold. For now we are left with convoluted discussions concerning his two belts and curiosity about his standing with the company he now seeks a share of. We ponder his chances against the top lightweight contenders, the ferocious Khabib Nurmagomedov and the unconventional Tony Ferguson. We wonder if either matchup revs McGregor’s engine enough to grant one of them the big money-fight.
Finally, however, there is the sense that we can no longer limit the extent of McGregor’s potential achievements. A man of his extroverted bravado will always have his doubters hoping someone can zero in on the target on his back. Eventually someone will, as someone did this past March. But those awaiting the day when the fortitude of McGregor’s self-assurance comes crashing down have yet to fully understand the fighter they’re watching.
“All that matters is how you see yourself,” Conor McGregor said, long before he knocked out the world’s greatest featherweight, before anyone could fathom him dethroning two champions. “If you see yourself as the king, with all the belts and everything…No matter what no one else says, as long as you see that, and really believe in it, then that’s what is going to happen.”
In most cases, such self-belief is eventually blunted by the harshness of reality. It is easy to laugh off the overzealous Dublin dreamer and his promise to take on the legend Jose Aldo before even making his debut. The safe bet would be to declare this slick talker an entertaining flash in the pan rather than take his two-belt pipe-dream with anything but slight amusement.
Skeptics overwhelm the conversations of the present, but in the pages of history they’re simply scribbles in the margins.
When Sonny Liston knocked out Floyd Patterson in their 1963 rematch, a loud-mouthed 22-year-old contender berated the champion from his ringside seat. He was all but loathed by the boxing world, this foul-tongued, barking boy. Many knew of his talent, but even they wished he would fade away into obscurity for all his brash boasting. What had this Cassius Clay done to be mentioned in the same breath as the heavyweight champion of the world?
