Leading up to his fight with (now former) champ Rafael dos Anjos, many people were questioning whether Eddie Alvarez’s best days were behind him. He has long been considered one of the best lightweights in the world, but the consensus opinion was that he may have peaked in 2012 while fighting for Bellator. After a first round smashing of dos Anjos, that opinion has been proven wrong.
And what did Alvarez do as his first action as UFC lightweight champion? He threw out a diss challenge to Conor McGregor.
“I would ask Dana White please to give me an easier fight like Conor McGregor. I deserve that. I’ve been fighting the best guys so I would like a gimme fight. Conor, I more than welcome that.
“Look, there’s a lot of guys in the UFC who are good at one thing and they get matched up stylistically well and they make their way to the top without ever going against the best guys, the true best guys like Rafael dos Anjos and the best guys in the division. They sneak their way around them. They live off perception, not what really is.
“He’s one of them. So I think he can get found out if he was ever to fight Rafael dos Anjos or fight myself, and he would get found out very quickly.”
All’s fair when trying to create hype for a fight against Conor McGregor, but it’s hard to agree with Alvarez’s stance that McGregor ‘snuck his way around’ Rafael dos Anjos. Rafael was Conor’s original opponent for UFC 196 and pulled out two weeks with an injured foot. After seeing the Brazilian fighter fall so quickly to Alvarez, McGregor is probably cursing the course of events that prevented him from becoming the first man to hold two championships at the same time.
But it shows that win or lose in August against Nate Diaz, McGregor still has lots of great fights left in the UFC. The winner of the Edgar vs. Aldo featherweight fight at UFC 200 will undoubtedly call him out, and now he’s got lightweight champion Eddie Alvarez angling for a fight too. That is, if Eddie can hold the belt until Conor is available. The 155-pound division is stacked with killers, and as we saw on Thursday night, one mistake is all it takes for the championship to change hands.
(Via FOX Sports)