Conor McGregor: Frankie Edgar Has A ‘Stink Of Desperation’

UFC featherweight champion Conor McGregor will attempt to become the promotion’s first-ever simultaneous two-belt holder when he takes on lightweight champion Rafael dos Anjos in the main event of March 5’s UFC 197 from Las Vegas, Nevada.

After he knocked out longtime former champion Jose Aldo in a mere 13 seconds at December 2014’s UFC 194, the overarching belief was that the ‘Notorious’ would take on Frankie Edgar next, but he surprised by moving up a weight class for an immediate title shot at dos Anjos. The mega-popular champ spoke up at today’s UFC 197 press conference to explain his reasoning for taking that route, noting that the only reason he’s fighting dos Anjos is because he’s in possession of the 155-pound belt:

“I chose this one because I came into this promotion as a two-weight world champion, I had always wanted to replicate that; create history, continue to create history. And this man across from me has a title. He has nothing else but that. He is a free TV fighter; he has nothing else to offer me except that gold belt, so that was the simple decision.”

Not surprisingly, McGregor also took the opportunity to explain his decision to pass Edgar once again, believing ‘The Answer’ to be less than deserving after three failed title shots, which he now thinks has dealt him an air of desperation. Find out what he said on the next page…

“There were many other options. Frankie has a little bit of desperation about him or somethin’; I don’t know. He went 0-2 in lightweight, got the chance to fight for the featherweight title and got the head slapped off of him, and then now is running around begging and it’s very; it has a stink of desperation off of it, so I’m just going to leave him sit for awhile.”

Finally, McGregor acknowledged the efforts of one Nate Diaz, who surprisingly came out in phenomenal shape and upset Michael Johnson at UFC on FOX 17 before calling out McGregor in a profanity-laced tirade to Joe Rogan:

“Nate, you know I like the way Nate came in his last fight. The previous fight before he came in sloppy, really out of shape, whining and complaining about everything and then came in and put on a performance like that, so he went back to the bottom of the pile but he came in this last fight in shape, he played the game a little bit more, so, you know, I can give respect to that, but we’ll see where it goes.”