Conor McGregor’s best subject has always been math.
Make no mistake, McGregor has mostly gotten perfect marks for his all-around MMA skills, too. His powerful left-handed striking style has perhaps been exceeded only by the ferocity of his personality. His trash talk has been dynamic, and his march from relative unknown to full-fledged combat sports icon has been breathtaking in both its speed and efficiency.
But cold, hard numbers have always been his true strength.
Prior to his loss to Nate Diaz at UFC 196 on March 5, McGregor hadn’t faced much adversity during his near-three-year campaign in the Octagon. He’d gone 7-0, won the featherweight title and proved that most of the fight company’s longstanding rules of engagement just didn’t apply to him.
The UFC was so smitten that it granted him the opportunity to move up to 155 pounds this month to try to complete his personal quest of simultaneously holding two titles in two different weight classes.
The organization had almost never done that before, but it did it for McGregor. Why?
Because of the numbers.
For a short primer in how much money the Irishman has been making for the UFC during his last few fights, allow MMA Mania’s John S. Nash to ballpark the figures for you:
None of this has ever been lost on McGregor, of course. While we’re tallying his many gifts, we should include perhaps a better understanding of the business end of fighting than any other athlete in MMA history.
“Love the numbers and the numbers will love you,” he quipped on social media in the days following his victory over Chad Mendes at UFC 189 in July 2015. “Ignore the numbers and the numbers will ignore you.”
According to a press release on Friday (h/t MMAJunkie), UFC 196 is “trending” toward becoming the best-selling pay-per-view in UFC history. McGregor should (and will) get the credit for that—with help from Holly Holm and Miesha Tate, as well as a last-minute assist from Diaz.
But if those sales figures are accurate, it means a record number of people tuned in to UFC 196 only to see McGregor get tired, boxed up and submitted in fairly easy fashion by Diaz.
How well the numbers continue to love McGregor after that remains to be seen.
For the first time in his UFC career, he finds himself retreat though certainly not out of the hunt. McGregor is still the featherweight champion, and his best immediate option is to recommit to making the difficult weight cut to 145 pounds for a title defense against either Jose Aldo or Frankie Edgar.
Either fight—almost certainly scheduled for UFC 200—would bring more big money and big exposure, as well as a good opportunity for McGregor to start rehabilitating his image inside the cage.
Stakes would be high, though, and it'd shape up as an absolutely must-win for him.
An integral part of being “The Notorious” Conor McGregor is the possibility that he could be the best fighter in the world, after all. It'll be hard to convince spectators—especially casual, mainstream types—to continue to suspend their disbelief if the losses start to pile up.
McGregor's early-career success was buttressed by a borderline mystical belief in himself. He has famously bragged, “I predict these things” while calling his shots against previously vanquished opponents. A big reason why that persona has worked thus far is that he’s been able to back up the talk with action.
The monster pay-per-view buys and heavyweight checks McGregor likes to crow about depend directly and inexorably on that. One thing can’t exist without the other.
McGregor's image can likely withstand one loss. How many, though, before all his trash talk starts to seem empty? How long before his love of the numbers starts yielding diminishing returns?
Perhaps for exactly that reason, the fighter's UFC bosses are doing their best to manicure the public reaction to the Diaz defeat. They remain committed, dogmatically repeating the company line that the loss happened because McGregor “jumped up two weight classes” to face Diaz.
Here's what UFC President Dana White said during an appearance on ESPN Radio this week (h/t FoxSports.com’s Damon Martin):
Conor McGregor is so much fun in the fight business. Guys don't do that [moving up in weight]. Guys who are making the money that Conor McGregor makes, has the money in the bank and all the things that are going on with him—he has a world title—he just decides to jump up two weight classes and fight somebody else.
That level of rhetoric has seemed to satisfy the mainstream media so far, though most hardcore MMA fans understand it’s only half-true.
Sure, the UFC 196 bout was contested at 170 pounds, but Diaz isn’t a natural welterweight. The only reason he and McGregor agreed on that weight was due to the short notice given to them after Rafael Dos Anjos dropped out with a foot injury.
In reality, this was a makeshift matchup between two natural lightweights who merely agreed not to cut weight. On fight night, perhaps Diaz outweighed McGregor by 10 pounds or so, but likely no more than that.
Weight may have helped Diaz absorb McGregor’s early power punches, and the added bulk may also have contributed to McGregor tiring out quickly. But the implication that McGregor lost because he stepped up in weight to fight a giant is obviously just not true.
That line of reasoning robs Diaz of the credit he deserves for winning.
He came into their fight with very little time to train and—in his own telling—fresh from a pleasure cruise in Mexico. It’s a disservice to him not to point out what he did well against McGregor—weathering his best shots, luring him into a classic “Diaz-style” bout and ultimately winning the day with his pressure boxing style.
But that rationalization is no good for neatly explaining away McGregor’s loss, so the people in charge of selling his next fight may not be interested.
The notion that Diaz won because he was the better fighter and not just because McGregor bit off more than he could chew weight-wise is, in fact, a dangerous one from a promotional standpoint.
Because perhaps it portends more rough days ahead.
For now, McGregor’s highfalutin ideas about challenging Robbie Lawler for the welterweight title—and indeed, maybe even fighting Dos Anjos—are on hold. He’ll go back to featherweight and continue to take on all comers.
White was right about at least one thing during that radio appearance, however: We should celebrate McGregor’s martial spirit. His willingness to fight anyone at any weight is one of the legitimately very admirable things about him.
Because of it, his marketability certainly remains viable in the short term. He handled the Diaz loss with pitch-perfect finesse. He was humble, introspective and honorable, and that will no doubt play well with fans as he moves on to the next thing.
But the proof has to be in the doing.
He has to win fights to make The McGregor Machine go.
Chad Dundas covers MMA for Bleacher Report. His debut novel Champion of the World is now available for preorder.
