Conor McGregor and mind games, name a better duo.
He is one of the best trash-talkers in combat sports history, and the way the insults mesh with his thick, famous inner-city Dublin accent leaves him up there with Muhammad Ali and Mike Tyson at the pantheon of trash-talkers.
However, in this new digital age, social media has brought a new aspect to the mental warfare that fighters so often engage in before fights, and McGregor has utilised it. It has been a wonderful marketing tool; a double-edged sword that makes him more money and gets inside his opponent's heads. He has participated in some form of online spat with nearly all of his UFC opponents.
In McGregor’s loss to Dustin Poirier back in January at UFC 257, there was a noticeable respect in the build-up from McGregor and a shortage of his usual antics. However, that has changed this time around.
There have been a few skirmishes on Twitter between the pair, with McGregor predicting all sorts of violence to be bestowed upon Poirier on Saturday night. Poirier responded to this by accusing McGregor of not following up on a promise to donate to his charity.
It turns out McGregor did pledge $500k in the end, but to a different charity, albeit one close to Poirier, The Boys and Girls Club of Academia.
“The Notorious” revealed he did not wish to donate the money to Poirier’s foundation, which he described as "random MMA gym for profit” in an interview with well-known MMA reporter Ariel Helwani.
"He jumped a gun. That's what he done. You know what I mean, at the end of the day. And I went with a reputable charity in the area.
"I had said I was gonna donate. Like I said it originally started as like a charity event. You know, it was gonna be a charity event and the profits off of the event were gonna go to charity. So when the fight actually got announced, when we made it under the UFC banner, then I kept it up. I said, 'I'll still help you out. I'll still give you the digo'. And then you know, it is what it is.
"I'm happy where it's gone. It's gone to the Boys and Girls Club of Academia. And not to just some random MMA gym for profit which is essentially what the attempt was."
Most recently, likely in response to these claims, McGregor shared a screenshot of Jolie Poirier, Dustin’s wife, requesting to message him on Instagram, to much fanfare.
Poirier posted a picture of him and his wife last night after the pre-fight press conference, captioned: “Me and the hubby walking into the press conference,” a jab to McGregor claiming Jolie was the man of the relationship during the presser.
McGregor then responded to the tweet with a screen recording of the Instagram DM request that Jolie Poirier sent him, thus proving it to be real.
McGregor antics at their bullish best.
On Saturday night, the social media “back and forth” between the pair will be fresh on their minds as they go toe-to-toe in the Octagon for their trilogy fight in Las Vegas.