Midnight Mania! McGregor: I Was Beating Khabib, Landed ‘Lovely’ Illegal Knee

Photo by Hans Gutknecht/Digital First Media/Los Angeles Daily News via Getty Images

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Welcome to Midnight Mania!

With Khabib Nurmagomedov’s latest title defense opposite Justin Gaethje just a few days away now and Conor McGregor seemingly booked vs. Dustin Poirier, perhaps it shouldn’t be a surprise that there’s growing talk about a potential rematch. Perhaps already working on selling himself into that fight, McGregor took to Twitter to re-imagine his first bout with Nurmagomedov in a more favorable fashion.

There’s a lot of weird falsehood to analyze here. First and foremost, McGregor might have landed more overall strikes than Khabib in the opening frame, but it’s almost universally agreed that Nurmagomedov won the opening frame. In addition to four minutes of control time, Nurmagomedov also out-landed McGregor in terms of significant strikes.

Far stranger that an argument over scoring is McGregor’s brag about his “lovely shot,” a knee to the face from his back while Nurmagomedov worked a kimura. It may have effectively saved his shoulder, but it was a blatantly illegal strike. That’s an argument against a rematch, one that makes him look worse!

Fighters don’t typically cheat when everything is going smoothly.

Insomnia

The SOUND of Justin Gaethje beating Tony Ferguson senseless was one hell on an introduction to crowd-less events.

This clip just made feel sad. All enthusiasm, no technique …

The build up to Israel Adesanya vs. Paulo Costa was a lot of fun, but somehow, I don’t think “Borrachinha” is enjoying the fallout quite as much.

Weird Weili Zhang workout of the week!

Beneath all the talk of “smash,” I am almost certain that Khamzat Chimaev is a fairly quiet, humble dude (with Ali Abdelaziz running his Twitter). Maybe I’m wrong, but this is cool either way:

It’s a good thing combat sports are so awesome and enduring, otherwise judges would have killed them all by now via sheer incompetence.

Slips, rips, and KO clips

Among the best possible ways to end a round:

The follow up to the knockdown is one of these weirder ground striking exchanges I’ve seen.

I do love strikes that begin with a full on sprint!

Random Land

A strange fish.

Midnight Music: Pixies — a band I love — recently released a cover of T. Rex’s “Mambo Sun” — a band and song I love! The result is … decent?

Sleep well Maniacs! More martial arts madness is always on the way.