Former champ champ Conor McGregor is currently engaged in a public tiff with UFC president Dana White, that UFC boss appears to be largely ignoring. McGregor says he wants to hold a boxing exhibition for charity vs. Dustin Poirier. McGregor also posted on his social network and then reportedly withdrew at the request of promotional interests in Saudi Arabia, that he will be boxing Manny Pacquiao. And McGregor says, now for the third time, that he’s retired.
Chael Sonnen, maybe the smartest man in MMA, spoke recently with Steven Marrocco for MMA Fighting, and offered McGregor some pointed advice.
I wish Conor the best, but if I could give Conor any advice, and I’ve given him plenty over the years – do not go into the promoting game, said Sonnen. You’re going to fall on your face, and you don’t know what you’re doing.
I’ve watched these guys go broke all the time. The inmates cannot run the asylum. There’s a few people alive that know how to promote. Everybody else is going to lose money. Conor is going to lose money.
They’re going to have to work this out. I’ve seen so many guys go head to head with Dana and thinking that they’re bigger than the organization, and these same guys – Jon Jones is going through it right now where he’s also retired and going to vacate, Henry Cejudo, God bless him, whether he was trying to play chess or he really sincerely thought ‘I want to go out on top’ – they were all doing it as an attempt to get over, and these guys, they’ve left the sport since. The sport goes on.”
It’s this very weird concept where you can lose touch. I don’t know how that happens. These are athletes that, for the most part, are just blue-collar, hard-working guys. I would also imagine that it comes from the people around them and tell him how great and valuable and important they are. It’s just one of these things.
