Conor McGregor & Dana White Tear into “Weasel” Espinoza

Despite the UFC President playing an instrumental role in the Floyd Mayweather Jr. vs. Conor McGregor spectacular, it appears he will never work with Showtime Sports again

The UFC President and the mercurial Irishman were not happy with the broadcasting giant’s official press release.

“When we did the Mayweather fight, I watched and took it all in, I just think all these guys, the guys who are promoting boxing today are bad at it,” White said (via MMAFighting.com). “I don’t think they do a good job, and I think I could do better. It sounds arrogant, but it’s the truth. I think I could do a better job than these guys do.

“You know, think about this, and I don’t give a s**t about Showtime’s f**king full-of-s**t press release they put out. It’s the biggest fight ever in combat sports history. The thing did over 6.7 million buys, and if the service didn’t drop, we would have got closer to seven million. It was the biggest event ever. It was the biggest boxing event ever, without a boxer. It was only one boxer involved in the fight.”

Espinoza, upon hearing of White’s tirade, addressed the issue on Twitter:

https://twitter.com/StephenEspinoza/status/949366080174256129?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.mmafighting.com%2F2018%2F1%2F5%2F16855554%2Fconor-mcgregor-dana-white-quarrel-with-stephen-espinoza-over-ppv-numbers

“Sounds like he’s upset because we committed the cardinal sin of telling the truth (when we released the accurate total for N. American PPV buys on MayMac). Strange that telling the truth, in a press release vetted by all parties in advance, is something to be “despised” for,” Espinoza wrote.

It did not take McGregor long to chime in:

https://twitter.com/TheNotoriousMMA/status/949370216676503553?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.mmafighting.com%2F2018%2F1%2F5%2F16855554%2Fconor-mcgregor-dana-white-quarrel-with-stephen-espinoza-over-ppv-numbers

“Shut your weasel mouth. Who gives a f*ck about the North American numbers when we are the GLOBAL KINGS you shmuck. WORLDWIDE. No.1!,” McGregor stated, in a post aimed at Espinoza.

It is not the first time that Conor McGregor and Stephen Espinoza have clashed. During the presser for Mayweather vs. McGregor, the Dubliner made accusations against the Showtime executive, claiming that he had cut his mic out to prevent him from interrupting Mayweather.

“You little weasel,” McGregor said. “Look at you-you little f**king weasel, I can see it in your eyes, you’re a f**king bitch. Cut my mic off? Cut the champ’s mic off? Hell no. You f**king weasel.” 

As for McGregor’s next bout, UFC President Dana White addressed that issue with Kevin Iole of Yahoo! Sports recently:

“I love that matchup (against Nurmagomedov), but Tony Ferguson is the interim champion, and Conor and I haven’t really figured out when he’s coming back and what’s going on,” White said. “So Conor has some big decisions to make here, really quick. If he waits — I don’t think Conor wants to fight until August, but if he waits until August or September, that’s around two years since the belt has been defended, and that can’t happen.”

Claiming that McGregor, as champion, has a duty to other fighters, White also claimed that his reign at 155-pounds would not be for too much longer if he remains inactive:

“Not only to the sport but to the other fighters,” White said. “This is game of time. Time is your enemy in this sport or any other sport. When you’re a professional athlete, time is your enemy, and we can’t let this thing go on forever and not give other guys the opportunity. Tony Ferguson has been around for a long time and has earned his dues, Khabib has earned his dues, and the list goes on and on. So, Conor has done very well, he’s made a lot of money, and if he decides that he doesn’t want to fight again for another, however long, that’s up to him. That’s his choice and his decision. But the belt has to move on, so we’ve gotta figure some stuff out about him in the next couple of months.

“As long as Conor is willing to (book a) fight by March, we could do Khabib versus Tony,” White said. “We could do Khabib versus Tony, and then the winner fights Conor for the title. Or if Conor doesn’t want to fight and wants to sit out until next fall, then we would have to make Khabib versus Tony for the title, not the interim title.”

Interesting times await fans of the UFC in 2018…

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