Anthony Smith reacts after submitting Devin Clark in their light heavyweight bout during the UFC Fight Night at UFC APEX on November 28, 2020 in Las Vegas, Nevada. (Photo by Chris Unger/Zuffa LLC via Getty Images)
Conor McGregor had claimed that he had many an injury coming into the Dustin Poirier fight at UFC 264
Conor McGregor suffered a dreadful injury towards the end of the first round at UFC 264, which saw him lose the fight to Poirier via TKO due to a doctor stoppage.
It was the first time, McGregor had lost two consecutive fights in his entire MMA career. Following his defeat and eventual discharge from hospital post surgery, McGregor took to Instagram to claim that he had stress fractures in his leg and a troublesome ankle going into the fight against Poirier at UFC 264.
Although it might be true, his excuses didn’t sit well with a lot of members from the MMA community.
More recently, UFC Light-heavyweight Anthony Smith, criticized McGregor for the same. Speaking to RJ Clifford of SiriusXM MMA, Smith explained that McGregor’s excuses were invalid to him, since no fighter “gets into the ring fully healthy.”
‘Lionheart Smith’ was quoted as saying:
“It’s easy for a fan or someone who has never done it to say, ‘Oh, he was hurt.’ We’re all hurt. Every single one of us, every single time we fight. There’s not one person that can ever say they go in 100 percent healthy. So his excuses are very invalid to me. To the general public, it makes sense that they people would buy into that excuse but Conor knows that all of us don’t buy it because we’re all hurt too. So, that’s how I look at it, but he’s not lobbying to us. It’s to the general public, the buyers, the PPV buyers. Those are the people he needs to convince but he knows he’s never gonna convince us.”
An angry McGregor fumed at the post-fight interview with Joe Rogan following his loss to Dustin Poirier at UFC 264.
‘The Notorious’ verbally attacked Poirier and his wife Jolie, despite being down and out with a broken leg.
His longtime friend and training partner Artem Lobov told MMA Fighting recently that McGregor shouldn’t have been interviewed right after his loss.
Lobov said:
““It was a mad situation. I mean, look at the way Anderson Silva and Chris Weidman were after his injury happened. … [McGregor] was still sitting up and I do think interviews shouldn’t even happen in that scenario. I’m surprised that it did happen. It shouldn’t have happened, but it is what it is in a way. You have to move on and live to fight another day. Now it’s time to heal, train, fix mistakes, and go back again. That’s it.” [via MMA Fighting]
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