The way he is promoting against Cowboy is exactly how Sonnen promoted against Brian Stann. He's going against an all-american blue collar guy, so he takes the high road and he's very respectful. There's not a lot of clips of the promoting left on YouTube that I can find, but there's a pretty good example: (timestamped at 2:39) Pretty much exactly the same as Conor did today.
Conman basically out cerroned cerrone. In other words conman man used Donald's own nice guy tactic against him. His mental warfare is top notch.
It all stemmed from one man Ali respected the hell out of several of his opponents. He really ramped it up against guys like Frazier, Liston, and Foreman. Just like Chael and Conor ramp it up against specific guys. So in terms of trash talk, you can say Conor copied Chael, but everybody copied Muhammad Ali. Most influential combat sports athlete to ever walk the planet was Ali
I didn't even say it was a bad thing. We stand on the shoulders of giants. I just thought it was interesting how Conor used Chael tactics. As another poster noticed, they all got it from Ali, who probably got it from Pro Wrestling. It's been done and done. it's just interesting to see it happening in real time.
I don't think he has it from Chael. It just happens to be similar. Chael had all his reasons for approaching that fight that way back then and Conor has his own reasons this time around to be respectful of this specific opponent. I don't think he used Chael as an example to how he should approach this fight.
Trash talk is really pointless if there's no reason for it. Like what- is he going to call Donald the "handpicked opponent?". I like the fight but honestly it still is a bit of a tune up.
No one finds Chael funny outside of Americans and nerds on Sherdog. It's why he has no international appeal. "Anderson Silva you absolutely suck" is his most famous quote. Shows of the true American wit and comedic genius of the man right there doesn't it? Also Cowboy isn't blue collar, it's called a gimmick. He was brought up rich
