Perhaps the weirdest part so far in Conor McGregor’s venture to The Other Side has been the Paulie Malignaggi interlude, in which he and the former boxing champ sparred — on two separate occasions — and came away with vastly different ideas as to what happened. On Friday, that slice of interior drama within the Floyd Mayweather lead-up (literally) took a sharp left. Paulie had contended he was “pushed” down during the second sparring session, which justified a leaked photo of him on the canvas while providing him occasion to blow up McGregor’s camp for exploitation.
Meanwhile McGregor — finally given a chance to respond to Malignaggi after his open workout in Vegas — said this was a classic case of somebody’s “ego [getting] dented.