Recently the 28-year-old Conor McGregor was asked about how he felt about his teammate Charlie Ward’s most recent fight, in which Ward’s opponent, Joao Carvalho died only 48 hours after the bout…
‘How do I feel?’ he replied. ‘How would you feel?’
‘It’s f***** up,’ he says, finally. ‘I wasn’t just watching that fight. I helped train a guy to kill someone, and then someone wound up dying.
‘This is a f****** dangerous game. People call it a sport, but it’s fighting. I’m just making sure it ain’t me. And that’s f***** up.’
‘Damn,’ he adds after a few minutes silence. ‘I still can’t believe that kid is dead.’
And then he was asked about his ‘odd’ training methods, particularly the ones involving Israeli movement specialist Ido Portal…
‘People are so caught in a routine, doing the same things over and over,’ he says. ‘I want to be an expert in different fighting styles, new training methods, new ways of thinking.’
‘I’ve learned new footwork patterns that are very unusual…’
‘I’ve learned how to find a lower centre of gravity and I’ve found more angles to throw shots. In a bout, I’m not just fighting another man. I’m dealing with another man and the ground. I want to understand how the ground can be my friend.’
And on his UFC 196 loss to Stockton’s own, Nate Diaz: ‘I want this rematch so bad,’ he says. ‘I’ll be better prepared this time. You can count on that.’
https://youtu.be/SeobjeG9rH0