Floyd Mayweather speaks about what it really was that broke McGregor down in the end as before he scored the 10th round TKO.
Coming into the Mayweather vs McGregor event we spoke on here about how body shots would subtly play a part in breaking Conor McGregor down as the bout wore on.
For two key reasons.
One, McGregor’s stamina was not used to anywhere near that of twelve three minute rounds in a championship fight.
That type of fitness and stamina is totally different to that required for anything he had done before. He admitted his gas tank let him down afterwards.
The second was that McGregor would not be used to defending the body shots from a boxing perspective.
Body punches are seldom used in mixed martial arts because of the difference in distance and stance implemented in both sports to get into range to score them.
Other than seeing the odd body punch in a clinch in MMA, or as Randy Couture used to put it in ‘dirty boxing’ – they’re not that frequent.
Body punching in boxing is a totally different ball game however.
Although to the untrained eye they might have gone under the radar a tad in last weekend’s fight in Vegas, Floyd Mayweather when speaking on TV after the fight highlighted their importance as one of the first things he brought up to ESPN:
“I just knew that if I dig you to the body, I don’t care who you are – I don’t think I really get credit for my body shots. Just like (in this fight against McGregor) in the Maidana fight – Maidana came out hard but I kept digging him to the body.”
As the fight progressed and as Mayweather began to toy with McGregor, body shots and pot shot right hands broke the Irishman down ultimately as his stamina faded.
