Photo by Jeff Bottari/Zuffa LLC
A great deal of the buildup to Conor McGregor vs. Dustin Poirier 3 has revolved around the tactics Poirier utilized to defeat McGregor in their rematch. Ideas such as “wrestling,” “kicking” and “defense” were ridiculed by McGregor, the former two-weight champion has made a point of attempting to shame Poirier for these strategies.
Fans on social media have reacted predictably, but one unique idea that has popped up was, “what if it’s misdirection, what if McGregor is actually going to wrestle Poirier?” At face value it comes across as a very silly suggestion - McGregor hasn’t actively wrestled very much in his UFC career, and even less at lightweight. His most intentional and consistent wrestling performance was against Max Holloway back in 2013, and he did hit a nice lateral drop on Diego Brandao in the following year. Other than a desperation double leg attempt vs. Nate Diaz, that is the extent of McGregor’s offensive wrestling in his UFC career.