Conor McGregor has been outspoken about bending the rules in MMA periodically. McGregor has never been penalized for his infractions but there are plenty of screenshots to go around in addition to his actual admissions of transgressions.
Here’s some of what he posted a while back:
In a true McGregor fashion, the tweets were deleted soon after they were posted.
The UFC fans keep a tally of all his transgressions – and they’re not limited to the Khabib Nurmagomedov match up. Subsequently he admitted to infractions during clashes with Poirier as well.
Despite all that a UFC lightweight came to his defense recently.
Twitter user just re-ignited the debate over whether Conor McGregor crossed the line during his UFC 229 match-up against Khabib Nurmagomedov.
Rising UFC lightweight Chase Hooper debunked a lot of the claims made.
He elaborated saying that it was not illegal to grab your opponent’s wrists in MMA. It was only illegal in situations where an opponent hooks their fingers inside the glove that they have control over their opponent.
Similarly, using your opponent’s posterior for grip is legal in MMA. However, moves like “oil checking” were problematic.
One point of contention what whether grabbing the Octagon’s mesh with one’s feet amounted to cheating. This situation can be compared to grabbing the mesh with your fingers to prevent a takedown. It gives the fighter extra leverage and would be illegal.
Hooper explained, “I could see it to an extent, but I’ve only had it feel like toes were going to get ripped off when they slip into the cage. But it’s illegal either way to be fair.”.
A lot of the controversy from the McGregor – Nurmagomedov showdown stems from allegations that Herb Dean, the referee, was a bit lenient towards the Irishman. McGregor got away with things like grabbing Nurmagomedov’s shorts and punches to the back of Nurmagomedov’s head.
Back then, McGregor criticized Joe Rogan for calling it out during the broadcast in a deleted voicenote saying:
“’That was an illegal knee on the head of a grounded opponent.’ “Shut up, Joe, you little fool. What are you talking about ‘smash this and smash that’? I was smashing my knee into his f***ing eye socket, yeah? ‘That’s a knee to a grounded opponent, call the cops.’”