When a lethal fighter threatens to beat someone up so badly that their children will plead them to retire, their first instinct probably won’t be to giggle.
However, that’s exactly how Eddie Alvarez reacted when Conor McGregor made the very same threat during the official UFC 205 media conference call on Thursday evening.
Each time the Notorious tried to push his buttons with his trademark mental warfare, he hit the laughter switch instead. Just have a read of some of the verbal sparring exchanges that occurred during the discussion below.
Conor McGregor – “He will get dropped, he will enter survival mode and then, and then I’m just going to butcher him and punish him and not let him out of there. So…”
Eddie Alvarez – “(Laughs) Alright!”
CM – “I don’t believe he’s been hit by anybody like me. I don’t believe he will survive. If he does survive and be in that survival mode then I’m going to toy with him and rearrange his face for his word that he is speaking right now. But I still can’t see him lasting one round.”
EA – “I’ll say whatever I want and then the night of the fight I’ll do whatever I want. Hahaha! You ain’t doing shit!”
CM – “You’re about to see your final hoorah.”
EA – “(Giggles) ‘final hoorah.'”
CM – “Say it, say it! Now it’s fucking over!”
EA -“Haha haha. This guy is drinking a cup of coffee or something, he’s getting excited.”
Meet the man hoping to crush Conor McGregor's hopes of making UFC history #UFC205 https://t.co/ICH6O5EVeB
— SportsJOE (@SportsJOEdotie) October 7, 2016
This is a far cry from what we’ve become accustomed to seeing from opponents who try to lock horns with McGregor in the trash talk department.
Remember when he kept taunting Jose Aldo with his own belt on that lengthy world tour? ‘Scarface’ didn’t really see the funny side of that.
When Chad Mendes stepped into McGregor’s realm before their interim title fight at UFC 189, the American seemed to genuinely enjoy the Irishman taking potshots at his height.
However, the smirk was wiped clean off his face once McGregor stated, “I could rest my balls on your forehead”.
There was a lot of animosity between McGregor and Dustin Poirier in the build up to the Dubliner’s first UFC PPV fight at UFC 178. McGregor pulled no punches with his smack talk, continuously referring to his opponent as a “Pea-head,” saying that he “probably has a cousin called Cletus” and even suggesting that his chin had deteriorated so much that when “a gust of wind hits him, he does the chicken dance”.
McGregor had taken up residency inside his head before the fight, and the whole ordeal proved to be a rough one for the Diamond.
The only exception was Nate Diaz. Like Alvarez, McGregor’s jibes seemed to roll off him like water off a duck’s back. Unlike Alvarez, Diaz didn’t do too much laughing.
Instead, he went tit-for-tat with his words and even scored some points on McGregor in the press conferences with his “zero fucks given” approach to doing media work.
Nate diaz clowning Mcgregor movement culture "touch butt" 🔫 pic.twitter.com/AZzadMDGAZ
— BoxingHypeStore.com (@BoxingHype) March 4, 2016
McGregor brutally knocked out Aldo, Mendes and Poirier, while he was submitted by Diaz in their first fight before grinding out a majority decision win in the rematch. There was a lot of factors that contributed to the way those fights played out, but it is unquestionable that McGregor had Aldo and Poirier rattled before they set foot inside the cage, while Diaz appeared to be the paragon of calmness.
Alvarez appears to have a similar mindset to Diaz as he has stated time and time again that he is genuinely enjoying being part of the circus act that goes with hyping up a McGregor fight.
Almost every time he opened his mouth during the official UFC 205 press conference, he was drowned out by a sea of boos, while McGregor’s snappy zingers sparked applause from the crowd. However, he had a wide smile splashed across his face for the entirety of the event, and he admitted on the MMA Hour that he savoured the experience.
“I was being completely honest when I said I enjoyed the press conference. I don’t take anything personally. If you know me as a person, even when someone’s trying to be legitimately malicious to me and saying things to me, it’s really, really hard for me to take things personal from anyone. I just kind of enjoy the show.”
It’s a different approach from Alvarez to the McGregor show, and while we’re not going to play amateur psychologist and try argue that it will have any sort of impact on the fight, it’s refreshing to see a different kind of reaction than the usual macho posturing.
Colm O’Rourke and Pauric Mahony join Colm Parkinson on a packed GAA Hour that includes Dick Clerkin appreciation and Sean Cavanagh envy. Subscribe here on iTunes.
