Advertisement

Conor McGregor claims he has best ‘ground and pound’ game in all of MMA

Conor McGregor has lost three of his last four fights.  (Getty Images)
Conor McGregor has lost three of his last four fights. (Getty Images)

Conor McGregor has claimed his ground strikes are the best in the entirety of the UFC.

The former two-division champion was the UFC’s biggest draw between 2013 and 2016, but a combination of injuries and poor form has seen him fight only four times in the past five years.

Of those four bouts, three have ended in defeat. He lost the UFC Lightweight Championship to Khabib Nurmagomedov by submission at UFC 229, before being knocked out twice in 2021 by Dustin Poirier.

McGregor broke his tibia in the second of those defeats to Poirier, and has been training ahead of a possible return later this year. The Irishman took to Instagram to boast about his fitness regimen and technical ability in the octagon.

“I’ve the best ground and pound in the game,” McGregor wrote. “My highest percentage of finishes does not actually come from my standing horizontal back hand, like most assume. My highest percentage of finishing wins actually come from the accuracy of my vertical punching (you are all novices vertical striking. Arm hitters. Ask ref to stop it hitters. Fall over on yourself hitters). I don’t miss [a ground and pound]. I do not hit arms. I do not fall in. I hit soft face, head and skull.”

McGregor’s level of self-confidence even stretched to bragging that he often barely breaks a sweat or suffers a misplace hair in a fight.

“It’s how you’ve seen people versus me absolutely cut up,” he added. “Looking like they’ve just got a bang of a few golf balls off the tee of a driving range. Skin fully opened. Yet me, skin like butter. Many times I’ve not even messed up my hair. That’s why a lot of these rat bags like to hate. I’m smooth like butter with it. The richest, the baddest, the most unscathed.”