Conor McGregor and Dustin Poirier will clash for the third time at UFC 264, and the EA Sports UFC franchise released its official simulation for the fight on YouTube this week. McGregor picked up the first win via a first-round TKO at UFC 178 in September 2014, which was still more than a year away from winning the UFC Featherweight Championship in a star-making victory over Jose Aldo. Poirier then came back and beat McGregor at UFC 257 back in January, putting the former champion down with a TKO in the second round.
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The simulation predicts their third fight will also make it to the second round, but this time with McGregor claiming victory. You can see the one-minute highlight reel below:
McGregor admitted in an interview with ESPN this week that he was looking past his fight with Poirier when they met in January, concentrating his focus on a big-money boxing fight with Manny Pacquiao.
“I pitied the man,” McGregor said. “I was looking past him. I had a Manny Pacquiao camp in place.”
The two will fight at UFC 264 at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas. The winner, as confirmed by Dana White, will get a future shot at Charles Oliveira’s UFC Lightweight Championship. Both McGregor and Poirier (albeit an interim reign) have previously held the gold.
McGregor hyped up the fight by saying all of his respect and admiration for Poirier as a fighter is now gone.
“I am a nice guy,” McGregor said. “It’s just about not translating it into the game. You can’t be nice in this business. No matter what. … In the most ruthless business of all, I am the most ruthless.”
“I’m coming in to kill this man,” he added. “I’m coming in with vicious intent here. Mortar shots. What else can I say? That’s the way it is. … I’m looking to take this man out cold.”
“The good thing about this one is if it’s crazy Conor again, I just don’t give a f—,” Poirier said in a separate interview with ESPN. “I really don’t care and in the last one, too, if he’d have been crazy, I’d have been all right. Mentally, I’m not a kid anymore. I’m a grown man, and I know what matters, and I know what I can control. I just don’t beat myself up mentally like I used to with the critics. I think it’s gonna be crazy Conor again. I’m pretty sure. I wouldn’t say funny, but it’s — how crazy can you be? You got knocked out last time. We put you on airplane mode in front of the world in Abu Dhabi. What can you say?”
