Conor McGregor made history at UFC 246 when he became the first fighter in UFC history to score finishes at featherweight, lightweight and welterweight thanks to his 40-second finish of Donald Cerrone at T-Mobile Arena on Jan. 18.
McGregor hailed his accomplishment in his octagon interview immediately after his win, but one man who wasn’t impressed was the last man to defeat him, UFC lightweight champion Khabib Nurmagomedov. This week “The Eagle” decided he wanted to remind McGregor of another stat, and took to social media to highlight the Irishman’s rear-naked choke losses against himself, Nate Diaz and Joseph Duffy.
Nurmagomedov’s manager Ali Abdelaziz retweeted his client’s post with the comment: “Wow this is not nice.”
It’s also not entirely correct.
The image posted via Nurmagomedov’s Twitter account showed, correctly, that McGregor had submitted to Diaz at 170 pounds at UFC 196, and to Nurmagomedov at 155 pounds at UFC 229. But it also suggested that the Dubliner’s loss to Duffy at Cage Warriors 39 came at 145 pounds when, in fact, it happened in a lightweight bout.
However, the crux of Nurmagomedov’s social media dig still stands, with the Irishman’s first career loss coming via kneebar submission to Artemij Sitenkov at 145 pounds in his third professional fight back in June 2008. So yes, as well as holding stoppage victories in three different weight classes, McGregor has indeed been finished at 145, 155 and 170 pounds.
All four of McGregor’s professional losses have come by the way of submission and, despite Nurmagomedov and his team’s apparent disinterest in a return matchup, the pair continue to throw jabs at each other.
Nurmagomedov is scheduled to face Tony Ferguson at UFC 249 on Apr. 18, and, after McGregor emerged victorious at UFC 246, UFC president Dana White said the rematch with Nurmagomedov is the right fight to make next and would represent the biggest fight in UFC history.
But first Nurmagomedov has to get through Ferguson, who intends to throw those plans into disarray by handing the Russian his first defeat on Apr. 18.
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