During an extended interview on ESPN yesterday Conor McGregor spoke out about two ugly incidents that have tarnished his reputation outside of the Octagon in recent times.
The first was the recent video footage that emerged from a pub in his native Dublin, which showed McGregor punching an old man sitting at the bar after he appeared to refuse to drink a shot of his ‘Proper Twelve’ whiskey.
“I mean, in reality, it doesn’t matter what happened there. I was in the wrong,” McGregor told Ariel Helwani.
“That man deserved to enjoy his time in the pub without it having to end the way it did. Although it was five months ago and I made amends back then, it doesn’t matter.
“I was in the wrong, I must come here and take accountability and responsibility. I owe it to the people who have been supporting me, my mother, my father, my family. I owe it to the people who trained me in martial arts. That is not who I am, that’s not the reason I got into martial arts. I got into it to defend against that scenario. To see that, it is like a dagger into my heart.
“I am just hear to own up to that and move on and face what is coming.”
The second incident happened several months earlier in Miami and again saw McGregor failing to control his temper as he grabbed a phone off a fan and proceeded to throw it to the ground, stamp on it and then pick it back it up and leave.
“In that Miami trip, I was preparing for battle,” McGregor said. “I brought my mother out. It was her 60th birthday. I brought the whole family out. We rent out and then the situation arose.
“I need to just stop reacting to the bait. People are trying to bait me into things. Am I the fish? Or am I the whale? I must be calm. I must be calm. I must be zen. I must lead by example. There’s so many people looking up to me. How can I react in this way? I need to get a hold of this.”
