Paulie Malignaggi, Conor McGregor‘s recent sparring partner, was fuming hot on Thursday night over leaked photos of a sparring session in which McGregor appeared to knock down Malignaggi.
Although this picture didn’t come from McGregor directly, only people from McGregor’s camp are allowed to take photos, according to Malignaggi. Following that logic, only McGregor’s team could have leaked the photo.
In the wake of the leak, the retired boxer let loose with a tweetstorm of his own, implying that the McGregor camp “an agenda from the start”—implying that McGregor’s team aimed to embarrass Malignaggi once he signed up to be the UFC superstar’s sparring partner, possibly as payback for his highly critical comments of The Notorious.
On Thursday night, Malignaggi fired off a rapid succession of tweets to explaining his side of the story. He said that the picture above was actually a pushdown, and that he had not been floored by a punch, as the leaked photo seemed to imply. Malignaggi also mentioned that UFC Performance Institute where McGregor trains has 24-hour cameras, and that his camp should release all the footage from their sparring match. “I actually beat his ass… post the vid,” he wrote.
Hate to say it but it's clear when I look back at my time there that there was an agenda from the start, too many clues. https://t.co/dxjLvu3Oyt
I actually beat his ass, 24 hrsoff a flight 2 lol, which is why Im saying post the vid, I try not 2 be petty but seems it's late 4 that now. https://t.co/vSE2Iw4ffM
As of Friday morning, McGregor had not responded to the post on Instagram or Twitter.
McGregor has been taking a little bit of heat, even by his usual headline-grabbing standards. He was called out by his future opponent, Floyd Mayweather Jr., who offered to use lighter gloves to further accommodate the UFC champ—an obvious public slap in an already heated war of words leading up to their superfight. Last week, McGregor had a back and forth with Mike Tyson—another high-profile flap with a boxing legend.
On the other side of the equation, Mayweather has been up to his usual antics, flashing a ridiculous amount of cash in the latest promo clip for episode 2 of All Access: Mayweather vs. McGregor, which releases Friday night at 10 pm.
