After chair near-incident, Dana White admits Conor McGregor gets special treatment – for good reason

The pre-fight news conference for UFC 205 delivered another memorable Conor McGregor moment for his career highlight reel: That time he picked up a metal folding chair and was ready to drop it on opponent Eddie Alvarez’s head.

Fortunately, UFC President Dana White was in the middle and made sure the chair wasn’t chucked, and additional UFC security personnel weren’t far behind. If watching McGregor get riled after Alvarez slid the chair behind White toward McGregor’s seat left you surprised, then you missed what happened between him and Nate Diaz in August. That incident, before UFC 202, involved water bottles and energy drink cans being thrown – and a massive fine levied against McGregor by the Nevada State Athletic Commission.

Today, during a town hall-style Q&A session hosted by Jim Rome on SiriusXM Rush Ch. 93, White explained what happened – and said it was a good thing cooler heads prevailed, given UFC 205 is the promotion’s debut at Madison Square Garden in New York and its first event in the state since 1995.

“Conor was in the middle of saying something, so I was looking at him – and the chair went flying behind him,” White said. “I thought that (Alvarez) threw the chair. But my guy has video footage and we looked at it. He was just fired up and just pushed the chair out of the way, and it just happened to slide across the floor. So Conor picks the chair up over his head like he’s gonna throw it at him. And I’m like, ‘Conor – do not throw this chair. Do not throw this chair.’ So I’m trying to stop it. These chairs are like 15 pounds – they’re heavy metal chairs. He could’ve cut his finger. Anything could’ve happened. I’ve got to get some plastic lawn furniture out there at these press conferences now.

“He says to me, ‘What do you think they would’ve charged me for a chair?’ Millions of dollars, I’ll tell you that right now, because the fight probably wouldn’t have happened. This is the first time we’ve been in New York (under the new athletic commission) and dealt with the New York State Athletic Commission.”

Things started off salty between McGregor (20-3 MMA, 8-1 UFC) and Alvarez (28-4 MMA, 3-1 UFC) because McGregor, as he quickly has become infamous for, was running late for the news conference. Alvarez, the lightweight champion who is putting his title up against McGregor, the featherweight champ, was on time – and unhappy his opponent wasn’t the same.

So does McGregor get special treatment from the UFC president? You better believe it, White said. But that doesn’t mean he’s exempt from some of the consequences – like over the summer when he didn’t want to do a pre-fight news conference and commercial work weeks in advance of UFC 200 while he was training in Iceland. The UFC called his bluff and he was left off what was then the biggest card in the promotion’s history.

“For me to say (McGregor doesn’t get special treatment) would be ridiculous – of course he does,” White said. “I respect this guy so much as a fighter, and there’s give and take in this business. It just can’t be take-take on either side. There’s give and take in every relationship. This guy has given, given, given. When we’re looking down the barrel of a fight being canceled, this guy steps up and takes any kind of fight. He deserves something back. So when he wants something, there’s give and take and I do it. A lot of these guys want, want, want, but don’t want to give back in return. So it’s that kind of relationship.”

But does that make him a pain in the backside? Again, of course.

“When people ask me if he’s difficult to deal with, yeah – he’s friggin’ 20 minutes late again today to a press conference,” White said. “And he says crazy stuff. But much like anyone who has kids, you pick and choose your battles. Him saying, ‘I’m not coming to the press conference.’ Then guess what? ‘You’re not fighting on UFC 200.’ You can’t not show up to a press conference. It’s the most important day of the week other than the weigh-ins and the fight – you can’t miss it. That was worth fighting to me.

“But all this other stuff, like he’s 20 minutes late – believe me, I have guys up his ass wherever he’s at trying to rip him out of the room and get him to the press conference. The media today was like, ‘He’s 15 minutes late – what are you gonna do?’ I’m gonna sit here and wait for him like the rest of you. What do you want me to do? There’s only so many battles you can fight. I think it’s his thing: ‘Everybody will wait for me.’ The one thing nobody has is time, and it’s such a slap in the face. I get it. He’s the king of mental warfare, and he wants to mess with his opponent. But these fans took time off work to come see this press conference. The media’s there. The networks have a time they go on. You have to respect other people’s time. It’s a respect thing. He just doesn’t do it.”

But because White considers fighters who are at McGregor’s level of success to be business partners with the UFC, that kind of special treatment will continue – as long as McGregor keeps giving back.

“Conor is definitely a force,” White said. “I’ve never seen anything like this kid. The thing that makes him the most special athlete that I’ve ever worked with is that if Eddie Alvarez fell out tonight, Conor would say, ‘Who am I fighting?’ And he’d fight somebody else no matter who it was. He would do it. Most guys don’t do that. They don’t do it. There’s too much on the line – there’s too much at stake. They’re too famous. They have the belt. They’re making too much money. He pushes all his chips on the table every time he fights.

“I think that’s what makes him the most special guy who’s ever fought here, or girl, and I think the fans would agree that they love that type of personality – even if you hate Conor and don’t like the way he acts, don’t like the things he says, somebody tell me the last time they saw a boring Conor McGregor fight. It doesn’t happen. It doesn’t exist. His press conferences aren’t boring, his weigh-ins aren’t boring, and his fights definitely aren’t boring.”

And for more on UFC 205, check out the UFC Rumors section of the site.