In a rematch between Khabib and Conor, who would be the A-side?

sonofjay817

sonofjay817

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I don't know if the person that won the first fight in a rematch situation gets to automatically be considered the A-side, but if so, let's eliminate that factor for the sake of the mental exercise. I think its fascinating that this is even a contentious question. There was a point in time, when Conor and Khabib were still relatively new in their respective UFC careers, that the idea of Khabib possibly garnering more hype and attention than Conor would have been laughable. You have a grappler/submission artist with stilted English and a not so colorful personality vs. a spinning, high-flying charisma machine in Conor. However, slowly but surely, the MMA world began to fall in love with the intangibles of Khabib's personality and his endearingly blunt communication style, not to mention his dominance in the Octagon. My opinion is that at this point in time, if both Conor and Khabib came back, Khabib would generate more excitement with die-hard MMA fans. The casual fan base is more of a wild card though, and I'm guessing would still be on the Conor bandwagon. Am I spot on, crazy, or just stating the obvious?
 
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It comes down to whether or not Khabib fans would spend that money that Conor's (remaining) fans would spend.
 
Majority of my friends still never heard of Khabib. Everyone knows Conor. Not sure that means a lot to you but that my experience
 
A Khabib return would def. get me way more excited than Conor return. Hell, its not even a question.

Now with that, who's more popular amongst casual fans? Most certainly Conor. Although I'm convinced he won't do the numbers he used to anymore. Not with Chandler, or anyone else.
 
Conor always, Khabib is a max 700k guy on his own (and that's being generous), he got a serious boost from the 229 fight against Conor, before that he was doing 350k buys in title fights.


Conor can fight literally anyone on the roster and do an easy 1.2mil buys right now bare minimum.

Even at Khabibs peak he wasn't touching 700k unless Conor was involved. I think his last fight against Gaethje was in the 650k range. They are not comparable on the commercial side, Khabib was largely unknown to the general public before the Conor fight, his fight against #9 ranked real estate agent Iaquinta did around 350k buys. He literally went from a guy most people didn't care to watch, to a household name amongst the casual fanbase just because of the Conor fight. Conor could've fought anyone after his 4mil buy event versus Mayweather, and that other opponent would've become a household name.


The A side is the guy who can make money and sell events anywhere he goes, Conor can fight Bobby Green and it'd be the biggest MMA event in years.
 
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sonofjay817 said:
I don't know if the person that won the first fight in a rematch situation gets to automatically be considered the A-side in a rematch situation, but if so, let's eliminate that factor for the sake of the mental exercise. I think its fascinating that this is even a contentious question. There was a point in time, when Conor and Khabib were still relatively new in their respective UFC careers, that the idea of Khabib possibly garnering more hype and attention than Conor would have been laughable. You have a grappler/submission artist with stilted English and a not so colorful personality vs. a spinning, high-flying charisma machine in Conor. However, slowly but surely, the MMA world slowly began to fall in love with the intangibles of Khabib's personality and his endearingly blunt communication style, not to mention his dominance in the Octagon. My opinion is that at this point in time, if both Conor and Khabib came back, Khabib would generate more excitement with die-hard MMA fans. The casual fan base is more of a wild card though, and I'm guessing would still be on the Conor bandwagon. Am I spot on, crazy, or just stating the obvious?
Click to expand...
Conor McGregor became irrelevant when he started fighting men his size at their weights HIS REAL weight who were in their prime
 
sonofjay817 said:
I don't know if the person that won the first fight in a rematch situation gets to automatically be considered the A-side in a rematch situation, but if so, let's eliminate that factor for the sake of the mental exercise. I think its fascinating that this is even a contentious question. There was a point in time, when Conor and Khabib were still relatively new in their respective UFC careers, that the idea of Khabib possibly garnering more hype and attention than Conor would have been laughable. You have a grappler/submission artist with stilted English and a not so colorful personality vs. a spinning, high-flying charisma machine in Conor. However, slowly but surely, the MMA world slowly began to fall in love with the intangibles of Khabib's personality and his endearingly blunt communication style, not to mention his dominance in the Octagon. My opinion is that at this point in time, if both Conor and Khabib came back, Khabib would generate more excitement with die-hard MMA fans. The casual fan base is more of a wild card though, and I'm guessing would still be on the Conor bandwagon. Am I spot on, crazy, or just stating the obvious?
Click to expand...
I don't think you're crazy, TS -- I tend to agree. Among fans on here such as myself, we'd be more excited to see Khabib, but anecdotally I feel as though I witness more acknowledgement for McGregor among casual fans than for Khabib. I tend to use my family and relatives as gauges, and they would predominately know more so who McGregor is than Khabib, sadly.
 
Conor will never be the B-side as long as he lives. Khabib should be grateful for the red-panty life the leprechaun gave him.
 
There is no A side in MMA. They fight for what's on their contract and don't go back and forth to see who gets a 70/30 split.
 
Conor will garner more attention. Khabib will silence those people in a rematch between the two.
 
blaseblase said:
A side is some dumb shit Floyd came up with
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Not true. There were lots of 45s before Pink Floyd came along, some were even decades before him, like Elvis Costello way back in the '50s
 
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