Mayweather’s Trainer: McGregor Sparring Footage Could Be Staged
Conor McGregor could be playing mind games with Floyd Mayweather ahead of their August 26th boxing bout, after footage leaked of the Irishman’s sparring session with Chris Van Heerden earlier this year – that’s according to Mayweather’s own trainer, Nate Jones.
McGregor and Mayweather have been rumored to be fighting for nearly a year now, but only this month did UFC President Dana White and The Money Team (TMT) strike a deal to officially make the fight a reality. Now the two biggest figureheads in combat sports will be going face-to-face on August 26th from the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Recently, one of “Money’s” many trainers, Nate Jones, took to Submission Radio to comment on the mega-bout between Mayweather and McGregor, and touched on the sparring footage that leaked out of “Notorious” and boxer Chris van Heerden. Jones said that after he saw the footage he believes that it all could have been staged (quotes via MMA Mania):
“I think I’ve seen that sparring. First of all, like I said, I looked at it, but to me it looked (like) it’s a possibility it could be staged. We don’t fall for that, we prepare for anything. Please believe me, I looked at it and I came up with my opinion that it could have been for real but it could have been staged. I don’t know. His style is a different style from Floyd. I don’t want nobody messing with Floyd. He may be more difficult than Floyd’s gonna be for him. Styles make fights. He may give him a different look inside this ring when he’s sparring him than what Floyd’s gonna give him. We don’t take none of that light. That’s a different man. That man’s name does not start with Floyd Mayweather, so we’re not worried about that. We’re gonna train hard. ”
“I looked it and after a while I watched the whole entirety of it, but I know that it could be staged and that don’t mean anything. We’re not gonna take that lightly. That don’t mean nothing to us. I looked at it, but it don’t mean anything. We’re gonna train like never before. I don’t think Floyd looked at it cause he don’t do that. We’re not worried about that, we don’t worry about that. When you look bad, it don’t matter to us because they could be staged. He might get in the ring with somebody else and they could be staged, or it could be him. We’re just going to see what’s going to happen on August 26th when he’s lined up with the very best. We’ll see then.”
So at least one member of Mayweather’s team thinks McGregor could have had the talked-about sparring video with Van Heerden staged to make him look worse at the sweet science than he really is, but that may not matter all that much even if it’s true when he meets the man who many believe is arguably the best boxer of all-time.
No matter how good he is or is not, however, two things are true: McGregor is going to get paid big, and he has little to lose in doing it.
