After an intense build-up through melees during media obligations, the second fight between Nate Diaz and Conor McGregor did live up to its hype. So much so that it has been already deemed as a Fight of the Year candidate for 2016.
Many casual fans were highly appreciative of the all-out action between the two fighters through the entire 25-minute bout. But for FOX Sports host Colin Cowherd, the rematch is easily comparable to the first encounter between Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier in 1971, a match-up that was then billed as the “Fight of the Century.”
“I saw something on Saturday night, in a sport which many of you will never embrace,” Cowherd said in the recent episode of his podcast “The Herd.” “But to me, it is the new standard for ritual drama, McGregor-Diaz. It is our Ali-Frazier.”
“Where during the fight and immediately afterwards, peers, other sports stars were in awe, like Ali-Frazier.”
Since it broke into the mainstream in the mid-2000’s, MMA has always been compared to boxing, sparking up dialogues about which form of prizefighting is more superior. For Cowherd, Saturday night’s event main event fight ended the said debate, once and for all.
“There are four or five things in my life, big businesses that have died. DVDs, newspapers, landline phones. And Saturday night by 9:30 Pacific, boxing died. That was the final nail in the coffin. Boxing’s dead.”