Malignaggi to work as Conor McGregor’s sparring partner

By BoxingNews.com

By Allan Fox: In a surprise move, Conor McGregor has reportedly signed on former 2 division world champion Paulie Malignaggi (36-8, 7 KOs) as one of his sparring partners to help him prepare for his August 26 fight against Floyd Mayweather Jr. Malignaggi, 36, recently stepped away from boxing in ending his 16-year pro career following an 8th round knockout loss to British domestic level fighter Sam Eggington on March 4.

What’s interesting about McGregor now having Malignaggi as a sparring partner is not long ago Malignaggi challenged McGregor. After all that, Malignaggi will get a chance to see first-hand how good McGregor is when he spars with him. McGregor is a bigger fighter than Malignaggi with more power, so if he catches him with a big shot in sparring, he could hurt him. But by the same token, McGregor hasn’t fought anyone with the talent of Malignaggi, and he could have a lot of problems with his boxing skills.

McGregor makes a lot of mistakes in the ring judging by his sparring efforts against Chris Van Heerden. Malignaggi will help McGregor fix some of the many technical mistakes he makes. But even a knowledgeable fighter like Malignaggi isn’t going to be able to work miracles in one training camp with the 28-year-old McGregor.

“The timing is up to their liking. They would probably need me in July,” said Malignaggi to Sky Sports News HQ. “If you’re looking at a situation where Conor is going to win the fight, it’s probably stretching it a little bit.”

Malignaggi will be just one of a number of sparring partners that will be assisting the Irish UFC star McGregor get ready for the fight with Mayweather. Malignaggi might be able to help McGregor get a ready for the tricky way Mayweather fights. Even with a cram course from Malignaggi, McGregor isn’t going to learn how to be a boxer and deal with Mayweather on August 26.

There are a massive of fighters that box for years since they were young, and they still never rise up to be a top level fighter. You have to ability. McGregor is doesn’t have the time to learn how to be a boxer. It would take too many years, and even then, he might not pan out. About the best that Malignaggi can do is save McGregor from being knocked out.

That would be a major accomplishment. Once Mayweather sees that McGregor how unskilled McGregor is, he’s going to hit him at will with head shots. McGregor isn’t used to getting hit a lot, so he could go down early unless Mayweather takes it easy on him for the sake of all the boxing fans paying for the event. This is such a bad fight. It would take something special from Malignaggi to teach McGregor enough for him to win.

Hopefully the boxing public respects the results of the fight if something unexpected happens. First the reaction from the fans will likely be that the fight was a sham. That would be bad news for boxing and for the upcoming September 17 fight between Saul Canelo Alvarez and Gennady “GGG” Golovkin.

For that high quality fight to have to follow after the Mayweather-McGregor circus fight, it could be really bad if something weird happens that makes the fight looked like it’s fixed. It’s pretty much going to be a bad deal for Canelo and GGG anyway with them following a super expensive fight like Mayweather-McGregor. Fans have to dig deep to pay for two PPV events within 3 weeks of each other.

“I’d like to see where Conor is at in his boxing, I’m sure he’s been training well before this,” said Malignaggi. “It’s like putting a ping-pong champion on the Wimbledon court with Andy Murray,” said Malignaggi in describing how it’s going to be for McGregor to try and compete with Mayweather.

It’s doubtful that Malignaggi to inform the boxing public about the results of his sparring sessions with McGregor. If anything, it’s likely that Malignaggi will be loyal to McGregor and say nothing about his true thoughts on his boxing ability or lack thereof. It doesn’t matter. There are so many people giving McGregor no chance whatsoever.

If Malignaggi is one of the few people that are saying good things about McGregor, he’s going to be drowned out by the massive amount of fans and boxing writers that view the fight as a big joke. It might be better for Malignaggi not to say anything at all about the fight, because eif he builds up McGregor by saying he’s a great fighter, he’s going to have pie in his face after Mayweather clowns him and makes him look really bad in beating him on August. The best policy would be for Malignaggi just to say nothing about the fight at all.

In the past, Malignaggi said he would “knock the beard off” McGregor if the two were to ever fight. McGregor wanted big game in Mayweather, and not fighters like Malignaggi. There would be very little interest in a McGregor vs. Malignaggi fight. This is all about collecting a payday for McGregor and Mayweather.

You can’t call this a sporting event. It’s just 2 popular fighters coming together for a fight with a lot of fans willing to pay top dollar to see it. I compare it to how when celebrities go play golf against pro golfers, and the fans turn out in big numbers to see the matches. Of course, the celebrities can’t compete with the pro golfers. It’s not about that. it’s about attracting interest from fans willing to pay to see the celebrities.

If McGregor can at least be competitive and have some small degree of success, it’ll be like a victory for him and his MMA fans. Look at Kell Brook in how he came out of his fight with unbeaten middleweight hampion Gennady “GGG” Golovkin as a hero after going 5 rounds with him. People forget that Golovkin stopped Brook in the 5th round. The fans forget about that and focus on the fact that Brook landed some punches every now and then. All McGregor has to do is land a handful of punches per round for at least 5 rounds, and he’ll be lionized by his MMA fans. It doesn’t matter if Mayweather stops McGregor in the 5th. The fans will still be super excited about him having been a little bit competitive with Mayweather.