Sean O’Malley was caught by surprise whenever he made it into Conor McGregor‘s latest rant.
McGregor Took Shots At Ryan Garcia & O’Malley
On social media, the UFC superstar went after boxer Ryan Garcia, who recently tested positive for performance-enhancing drug Ostarine, putting a major asterisk on his decision win over Devin Haney. McGregor called for a lifetime ban on “King Ryan” for popping for PED’s among other things and he even brought bantamweight champ O’Malley into the whole debacle.
Where exactly does O’Malley fit in the conversation? Well, before he was ever crowned champion, the young O’Malley tested positive for Ostarine back in 2019 and McGregor has not yet forgotten, challenging the pair of “Ostarine heads” to a sparring session in Ireland.
Conor McGregor just went wild on Ryan Garcia and Sean O’Malley 😳 pic.twitter.com/q2s1Tat3fN
— Happy Punch (@HappyPunch) May 3, 2024
“Suga” DM’ed McGregor Afterwards
O’Malley and McGregor were as cool as can be with each other until this recent controversy came about. The rising star of O’Malley had much respect for what came before him in McGregor and the two even linked up a few years ago.
Fast forward to now and whatever friendship they might have had is apparently long gone.
“To be honest, I kind of wanna hate him,” O’Malley said of McGregor on Bradley Martyn’s Raw Talk. “I wanna be like f*** you and I’ve tried to, I’ve said it, I even messaged him on Twitter. I said, ‘F*** you’, just to make me feel a little bit better.”
“He’s Starting To Get Pushed Out… He Sees Me Blowing Up.”
As to why McGregor dropped his name in his roast of Ryan Garcia, past PPV headliner O’Malley believes there are a couple of reasons behind his lengthy rant, blaming it on jealousy and drug use.
“Cocaine’s a hell of a drug. He was probably shadow boxing in the bathroom at a club. And I get, I get it, you know, you say s***. So, I do think there was a lot of jealousy, people like that, that big of an ego. He sees what’s happening. He sees like, he’s starting to, you know, he’s starting to get pushed out. I’m starting to come up. It’s like, yeah, there’s no other reason for him to talk about me.
“I’ve never said anything but praised him,” O’Malley cleared up. “You know, I’ve looked up to him, so I wanna try to hate him. But, you know, it’s hard. Conor, he is the man– he really is. But, I don’t know. I really don’t feel any way about it. When I first saw it, I was like, what the f***? Like, that’s crazy. But then, I’m like, god, I know he is probably, he’s geeked out, you know, jealous. So, he wanted me to sign with their management company… I didn’t want to. So, he sees me blowing up. He deleted it real quick after I’m sure either his team did or he is like, ‘God, why did I do that?’ But, I don’t know.”
O’Malley Makes The Exception To Fight Conor McGregor At Lightweight
The reigning and defending champion at 135lbs has made it known that he wants to move up in weight at some point for a featherweight title fight against Ilia Topuria. With that still a while away from happening, O’Malley was asked if he’d ever consider an actual UFC fight with the bigger Conor McGregor, rather than a spar with the former two-division champ.
“Me vs. Conor?” O’Malley said with a laugh. “That’d be big nowadays. I’m pretty realistic when it comes to like big guys. Like, I’m like, okay, I’m a 135’er. I stay in my lane, I do my thing. I’d go up to [1]45, fight [Alexander Volkanovski] Volk. I’d fight Ilia [Topuria] and I’d fight Max [Holloway]. But like, I’d stay in my lane.
“Conor’s one of the only guys I would fight that, [where] I’m like, ‘That motherf*****’s big’. I would fight him at [1]55′. I’d fight him at, first of all, it’s a huge payday. Second of all, Conor, that’d be legendary. So, he’s one of the rare guys I would fight that are actually way outta my weight class.”
Closing in on his 36th birthday later this year, is Conor McGregor starting to get ‘jealous’ of the younger Sean O’Malley’s climb to superstardom?
