There’s a long history of fighters moving up in weight to take on new challenges in combat sports, and I’m not just talking about Conor McGregor. Even in the annuls of MMA history, figures such as BJ Penn, Anderson Silva, Randy Couture, and Kazushi Sakuraba all built legacies, in part off their willingness to take on bigger combatants. And that says nothing of the openweight era where fighters routinely faced off against opponents of all sizes.
Turn to boxing and Manny Paquiao’s journey from flyweight to welterweight is not only an amazing feat, but part of a long long legacy of great boxers moving up in weight to take on bigger, more difficult challenges.