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17th Aug 2017

Conor McGregor gives Paulie Malignaggi’s St Paddy’s Day proposal the response it deserves

Nice try

Ben Kiely

Just like everyone else, Paulie Malignaggi wants his own red panty night against Conor McGregor.

Paulie Malignaggi may feel like he was played by Conor McGregor, but honestly, what did he expect?

The former world champion was given fair warning about McGregor’s plans for him as a sparring partner. McGregor made it clear from the get-go that he was only drafting him in to teach him a lesson.

“We’re going to have a knock, then he’s going to have to answer to what he’s been saying.”

McGregor used Malignaggi to prove a point. He wanted to show the retired pugilist that he couldn’t beat him with one hand tied behind his back. He just wanted to do what he’s built his legacy on – prove another doubter wrong using the most violent method possible.

Malignaggi showed up for 20 rounds worth of a knock, quit the camp in a rage after accusing Team McGregor of deliberately leaking photos to make him look bad. The dispute just got uglier and uglier and then the footage dropped which only made him look worse, at least, in comparison to the UFC superstar.

As he had been doing since it was announced that he would be joining McGregor’s team, Malignaggi spoke to the media.

Pissed off over the brief clip of him getting bested by ‘The Notorious’ going viral, he told numerous publications that he would be willing to step inside the ring to fight McGregor again. He eyed up a professional boxing bout against McGregor with St Patrick’s Day 2018 the date he had in mind.

McGregor is a bit busy at the moment. He has the rather large task of trying to hand Floyd Mayweather his first professional loss in his professional debut to look forward to on August 26. As he explained during a media conference call on Wednesday, if Malignaggi wants to fight him, he will have to wait.

“Tell the kid to join the queue. Tell him to shut his mouth and join the queue.”

“He got his ass whooped and went sprinting, I don’t know what else to say about the guy. But hey, there is a big list of people that want to get in there and fight me, so tell him to join the queue and we’ll see what happens after the (Mayweather) fight.”

When you get to the queue, Paulie, say hello to Nate Diaz, Tony Ferguson, Khabib Nurmagomedov, Jose Aldo and eh… oh yeah, pretty much every fighter under 170 lbs on planet Earth.