Feels Like the Stars Aligned Many Times to Create Conor's Success

[LittleSmokey]

Everything in life is about timing.

 

[CPH]

I imagine that's part of the reason he went so hard on trying to piss Dustin off before the fight.

I don't remember Conor talking shit to or about anyone before that fight.

That’s the thing about Conor’s shit talking: it isn’t just about promotion. It’s piling the pressure on the other guy and setting that classic standup fighter’s trap: getting the opponent to forget his grappling, to instead come out aggressive, loading up, overextending and gassing like a novice.

Conor has the skill to catch good strikers regardless, but it just makes it sooo much easier when they are pumped full of adrenaline and playing the game he wants them to play.

 

[Rear Naked Toke]

That’s the thing about Conor’s shit talking: it isn’t just about promotion. It’s piling the pressure on the other guy and setting that classic standup fighter’s trap: getting the opponent to forget his grappling, to instead come out aggressive, loading up, overextending and gassing like a novice.

Conor has the skill to catch good strikers regardless, but it just makes it sooo much easier when they are pumped full of adrenaline and playing the game he wants them to play.

I've always looked at his pre fight talk as that. Sure, it sells PPV's but it also increases his chances of winning. I'd like to say it's the main reason he beat Aldo, but he planned that counter long before the fight, anticipating that a heated Aldo would rush forward. I give him 100% credit on that one, it was not a fluke. But I do think Aldo would've been less aggressive out the gate without the pre-fight talk. Not to say he wouldn't have still landed that counter at some point.

Overall, it's a great tactic and was successful for him a few times, but it's barely worked for him since. On the other hand, it did bring in a lot of eyeballs.

 

[Herwald]

Casuals don't give a shit about your fighting talent. They care about heat, story and character - about entertainment. That's it. Conor nailed all of it.

 

[CPH]

I've always looked at his pre fight talk as that. Sure, it sells PPV's but it also increases his chances of winning. I'd like to say it's the main reason he beat Aldo, but he planned that counter long before the fight, anticipating that a heated Aldo would rush forward. I give him 100% credit on that one, it was not a fluke. But I do think Aldo would've been less aggressive out the gate without the pre-fight talk. Not to say he wouldn't have still landed that counter at some point.

Overall, it's a great tactic and was successful for him a few times, but it's barely worked for him since. On the other hand, it did bring in a lot of eyeballs.

I think that the first Diaz fight undermined that strategy by establishing a clear blueprint for beating him. After that fight, every team realized that getting him into round 3 opened up the path to victory. Engaging him in the striking early, aggressively was now inexcusably stupid.

Of course, not every top 10 fighter has the skill or the discipline to execute, as we saw with poor Eddie.

 

[Pastinaca1]

Winning fights is by far the most important thing.

But his charisma was a huuuge factor. Dana liked him since day one and he got interested in promoting him like crazy.

To be successful in this sport you need to win (and finish) your fights and have a personality that make people care about you.

Conor has it all. He also dressed in a way that no other fighters did before. His trash talking was different and more clever. It looked more genuine and funny, and his accent made it 10x funnier.

After the Eddie fight it was all downhill for him, but for 3 years he rules the MMA world.
Obviously he had some luck, but also he made things happen.

 

[Pastinaca1]

Casuals don't give a shit about your fighting talent. They care about heat, story and character - about entertainment. That's it. Conor nailed all of it.

Yes but if you lose fights no one cares about your character or heat.
No. 1 thing is to win fights, then comes the personality part. Conor had both.

 

[Zed237]

conor got the lowest of the LW champions, eddie alvarez, who split decisioned his way to a title shot. i would not say this was a bad eddie alvarez performance bc eddie is really a brawler.

 

[TheBulge]

TS is a goof.

Conor is an all time great, champ of multiple weightclasses who has a good resume which has aged better than any other fighter's resume. One of the best wins in MMA history against Aldo and Alvarez, a big win against Mendes, Diaz, Max Holloway, Justin Poirier, Cerrone and other decent wins. Great resume. The Aldo win alone solidified his all time great status.

TS can't think for himself.

 

[Herwald]

Yes but if you lose fights no one cares about your character or heat.
No. 1 thing is to win fights, then comes the personality part. Conor had both.

Look at Nate's, Conor's, Till's, Masvidal's records. Brock could come back right now and sell.

You have personality, if people dig your "story" - you only need to win enough to stay in the game. If your performances are visually spectacular (which Conor was also), it's awesome and helps, but I refuse to give it any more respect cause it's the only thing everyone always focuses on and it's like 12% of a fighter's success.

It's like art dweebs and movie dweebs who go to film school and talk all that artsy crap and are shocked by realities of movie business, show business and how time is a finite resource. It's half and half - show... business. But one half always gets severely ignored. And in MMA, it's even worse. Like pro wrestling these days - everything gets ignored except workrate in the cage.

Prime Conor brought everything. Around the Floyd fight is when he fizzled out, but in his prime - he was doing everything right. Hundreds of little things that most fighters simply don't have the balls to attempt cause they're afraid of what people will say if they fail.

 

[snackgod]

Conor is talented as hell, no doubt about it.

But there are many fighters with similar talent levels that never, ever obtained his level of success.

It feels like things literally happened exactly the way they needed to for him to blow up the way that he did.

When Conor Arrived in the UFC, he was a bit strong 145 pound fighter, possibly the biggest strongest 145'er in the division.

he had great, explosive striking, and beat 5 strikers in a row. No Wrestlers.

Brimage, Young Holloway, Diego Brandau, Poirier, and Dennis Siver.

His first fight against a wrestler was Chad Mendes on two weeks notice, out of shape. He was taken down at will until Chad gassed from lack of conditioning.

Conor wins.

Fights Aldo, Aldo fights stupidly and runs right into the left hand counter and goes down.



Great, Well Played Conor, amazing.

Conor decides not to defend against anyone and try his luck at a higher weight class. Conor only takes fights with everything to gain and nothing to lose.

Was supposed to fight RDA. I believe that RDA would end him. But his foot was a balloon.

Fights Diaz and gets smoked. Great. Doesn't go back down to defend.

He gets an immediate rematch and arguably loses it. Close, Majority Decision against a LW journeyman at WW.

Then he gets a gifted shot at Lightweight.

Gets Eddie Alvarez. Alvarez fights terribly, gets destroyed and smoked. Khabib said the fight looked fishy and fake. I don't believe so it was just a terrible performance by Alvarez and great one by Conor.

That ends Conor's contributions to MMA. That was everything that he did.

He did great by acting like a boxer. He only fought when he had everything to gain and nothing to lose, and those fights against Aldo and Alvarez were his biggest wins. You could say they are his only wins that were relevant and mattered.

Guys in MMA don't make a huge dynasty off of two wins. Only Conor does.

conor took chael act and since he won with the pull of things like twitter an ig was the perfect storm for conor. if conor didnt win like he did there isnt the levels of it now.

 

[snackgod]

He still had to go in there and throw the punches and kicks while dodging punches and kicks

the blwoing up of twitter and ig with hwo flashie his fights were happened at the right time to blow up.

right place at the right time.

chael was who conor modeled after an since conor won titles he took him to the ungodlly places.

 

[acannxr]

Conor is talented as hell, no doubt about it.

But there are many fighters with similar talent levels that never, ever obtained his level of success.

It feels like things literally happened exactly the way they needed to for him to blow up the way that he did.

When Conor Arrived in the UFC, he was a bit strong 145 pound fighter, possibly the biggest strongest 145'er in the division.

he had great, explosive striking, and beat 5 strikers in a row. No Wrestlers.

Brimage, Young Holloway, Diego Brandau, Poirier, and Dennis Siver.

His first fight against a wrestler was Chad Mendes on two weeks notice, out of shape. He was taken down at will until Chad gassed from lack of conditioning.

Conor wins.

Fights Aldo, Aldo fights stupidly and runs right into the left hand counter and goes down.



Great, Well Played Conor, amazing.

Conor decides not to defend against anyone and try his luck at a higher weight class. Conor only takes fights with everything to gain and nothing to lose.

Was supposed to fight RDA. I believe that RDA would end him. But his foot was a balloon.

Fights Diaz and gets smoked. Great. Doesn't go back down to defend.

He gets an immediate rematch and arguably loses it. Close, Majority Decision against a LW journeyman at WW.

Then he gets a gifted shot at Lightweight.

Gets Eddie Alvarez. Alvarez fights terribly, gets destroyed and smoked. Khabib said the fight looked fishy and fake. I don't believe so it was just a terrible performance by Alvarez and great one by Conor.

That ends Conor's contributions to MMA. That was everything that he did.

He did great by acting like a boxer. He only fought when he had everything to gain and nothing to lose, and those fights against Aldo and Alvarez were his biggest wins. You could say they are his only wins that were relevant and mattered.

Guys in MMA don't make a huge dynasty off of two wins. Only Conor does.

I get that he's not popular but to trying to dismiss someone's accomplishments is one of the lamest things MMA fans do. If you play a certain angle, you can do this with any fighter.

For example, the stars weren't on his side when Aldo pulled out. Then he had to fight a wrestler on short notice. The stars weren't on his side when RDA pulled out and he ended up getting choked out by Nate.

It wasn't a perfect run but you can collect all the positives (or all the negatives) and push either narrative if try hard enough. This is bias.

There's no guarantee of success but these guys/girls train very hard to better their chances.

I'll just quote myself from several years back:

They weren't necessarily "easy" opponents, but anyone who believes that the UFC didn't protect McGregor through the matchmaking with stylistically safe matchups is in denial.

April and August, 2013
#31 Marcus Brimage - Striker
#70 Max Holloway - Striker (injured, short notice)

July and September, 2014
#32 Diego Brandão - Striker/BJJ
#10 Dustin Poirier - Striker/BJJ

*At this point McGregor was expected to face the winner of Aldo/Mendes, but he chose to remain active instead.

January and July, 2015
#19 Dennis Siver - Striker
#4 Chad Mendes - Wrestler (injured, short notice)

You can examine it a step further and look at how the wrestlers were purposely tied up:

November 2014
#2 Frankie Edgar (wrestler) was booked against #4 Cub Swanson
#6 Ricardo Lamas (wrestler) was booked against #8 Dennis Bermudez (wrestler).

April 2015
#5 Ricardo Lamas (wrestler) was booked against #4 Chad Mendes (wrestler).

May 2015
#2 Frankie Edgar (wrestler) was booked against #4-BW Urijah Faber (wrestler).

If Aldo hadn't gotten injured, it was the UFC's plan to grant McGregor a title shot after having fought only one top ten opponent (who wasn't a wrestler); and during his feud with Diaz the UFC continued tying up his bad matchups at Featherweight until they eventually killed themselves off, which gave McGregor an out to not fighting them.

Additionally, they gifted him a Lightweight title shot in spite of them having been cold on the idea when other champions asked for the same opportunity (Aldo, RDA, etc.). He then goes 1-1 against #7 Nate Diaz (non-wrestler) and receives yet another shot at the Lightweight title, in spite of an undefeated contender being promised it (Nurmagomedov).

The thing is, I don't think McGregor would have turned down those fights at Featherweight, and in all likelihood he would've won, but to pretend like the UFC wasn't protecting McGregor is absurd.

 

[Emjay]

the blwoing up of twitter and ig with hwo flashie his fights were happened at the right time to blow up.

right place at the right time.

chael was who conor modeled after an since conor won titles he took him to the ungodlly places.

He still had to do his part.

Stop trying to discredit the man's hard work because you want to feel better about yourself.

 

[riitzni]

Thread comes off as mad haterish. The stars align is a nice way of saying he beat everyone in front of him including the incumbent LW champion who is usually the most skilled fighter on the roster.

I don't even like the guy but this ain't it chief.

 

[snackgod]

He still had to do his part.

Stop trying to discredit the man's hard work because you want to feel better about yourself.

when did i discredit him at all. it was teh perfect storm an conor took everyone on an amzing ride.

if he didnt back up his trash talk in flashy ways he be seen as boring gsp.,

if he did al lthat talking and gotten smoked than he be seen as chael 2.0

 

[moreorless87]

It helps when the promotion is on your side, no rematch for Aldo against Conor, rematch for Conor against Nate, guys like Mendes paid to step up and take last minute fights were Conor has a full camp.