When news broke last November that Conor McGregor was granted a boxing license in the state of California, two-time boxing world champion Paulie Malignaggi was vocal against it. After first saying that it would be “laughable” to see McGregor fight in a boxing ring, he himself went on to issue a challenge to the Irishman, promising to “knock the beard off him.”
His tune has changed during his interview on Monday’s MMA Hour episode, where he also confirmed that he will be part of McGregor’s camp as one of the sparring partners, in preparation for Floyd Mayweather. This time, he believes “The Notorious” does have a good chance against boxing’s former pound-for-pound king.
“What I’ve been saying from the start, you need to look if Conor can have certain moments in the fight,” Malignaggi said (via MMA Fighting). “I don’t think you can just outright say, ‘Conor wins the fight;’ it’s just outright too much of a jump. But here’s where you can start to think Conor wins the fight: you look for Conor to have certain moments in the fight, whether he can get Floyd’s attention, maybe land a particular punch or particular shot or particular combination.”
“Figure out ways where Floyd’s falling for certain things, because Floyd is so smart, he doesn’t fall for very many things. Figure out ways where you can set certain traps for Floyd and land a couple of shots here and there.”
Malignaggi recognizes the obvious in that McGregor does have the ability to knock an opponent out with one punch. While he thinks it is doable, he also stated another evident fact that it will not be easy to get there, especially against a fighter of Mayweather’s caliber.
“Obviously, Floyd has more pros going into this fight because it is a boxing match. But when a guy hits as hard as Conor McGregor, all he needs to do is look to grab certain moments in the fight,” Malignaggi said. “A moment here, a moment there. Can he turn one of these moments into a bigger moment that can possibly turn into real danger for Floyd Mayweather?”
“And that’s kind of how you want to view the fight if you’re looking at Conor McGregor’s chances of winning the fight. Because if you just look at it, ‘oh, Conor can win the fight’ — it’s not that simple, it’s not that black and white. There’s a lot of gray area in there. You probably favor Floyd Mayweather in the fight. But there’s intangibles that I just spoke about, that you think that maybe Conor has a chance.”
Malignaggi will be flying out to Las Vegas on Wednesday to begin his work with McGregor and the rest of team SBG.