The unseen footage of UFC lightweight champion Conor McGregor sparring with two-weight world champion boxer Paulie Malignaggi has arisen up online as part of a marketing push for the new documentary film, “Conor McGregor: Notorious.”
The new footage adds a bit more essence to the already well-covered dispute between the former professional boxer and McGregor.
The dispute between these two combat sports athletes began when McGregor and his team invited Paulie Malignaggi to assist the Notorious in his preparation to fight Floyd Mayweather in a boxing match.
Malignaggi, who announced his retirement from boxing back in March. Team McGregor said it was a one-sided thrashing and released footage that seemed to show Conor knocking Paulie down. Later, Malignaggi to publicly declare that he would like to fight McGregor once the bout with Mayweather was closed.
“No, he’s not going to release that,” Malignaggi told Starsport earlier this week. “If he releases that footage, everything he says is a lie. There’s no way he’s going to release that footage.
“Here’s the thing about Conor McGregor: He understands the psychology of the term perception is reality. He lives by that. He doesn’t live by a true reality, he lives by a perception is reality type of thing. He makes things bigger (than they are).
“His accomplishments, when he accomplishes something, he makes it a bigger thing than what it is. When something doesn’t go his way it, he’ll make it as of little consequence as he can.”
The video shows Paulie Malignaggi and McGregor involved in trash-talking each other as they fight, then Malignaggi said “I’m trying to f*ck you up,” to which Conor McGregor replies “keep trying.”
A boxing match between Malignaggi and McGregor could certainly draw in more than a few pay-per-view buys. The amount of drama that was initially created when McGregor’s team uploaded the sparring images and videos of Malignaggi.
Check out the sparring footage below:
