Conor McGregor's decline: From Mayweather payday to legal troubles

Conor McGregor has won exactly one UFC fight since pocketing over $100 million for his boxing match against Floyd Mayweather in August 2017.

The payday from that night — a 10th-round stoppage loss that generated 4.3 million pay-per-view buys and a $55.5 million live gate — dwarfed McGregor's previous high of $6.8 million for beating Eddie Alvarez, according to ESPN. UFC president Dana White said at the time that the Irishman might never compete again. "Try to get up every day and get punched in the face when you have $100 million in the bank," White told reporters in November 2017, per the ESPN retrospective. "Money changes everything."

From cage invasions to criminal charges

What followed was a string of incidents that shadowed McGregor's competitive decline. In November 2017, he jumped into the cage at Bellator 187 in Dublin before teammate Charlie Ward's fight was over, sparking a melee. Four months later, White announced plans to strip McGregor of his lightweight title due to inactivity. Days after that, McGregor and a group stormed the Barclays Center loading dock in pursuit of Khabib Nurmagomedov, hurling a metal dolly through a bus window and injuring three fighters. McGregor turned himself in to the NYPD on assault and criminal mischief charges. White called it "the most disgusting thing that has ever happened in the history of the company."

McGregor returned to face Nurmagomedov at UFC 229 in October 2018, losing by fourth-round submission. He beat Donald Cerrone in 40 seconds at UFC 246 in January 2020 — his lone octagon win since the Mayweather bout — then dropped two fights to Dustin Poirier, the second ending with a broken leg at UFC 264. Combat photographer Esther Lin, who captured the iconic Toronto press conference image of McGregor and Mayweather facing off in July 2017, told ESPN that McGregor realized his star power on that promotional tour. "He certainly embraced it during the tour and knew exactly how to ride that to the top," she said.

McGregor is scheduled to return against Max Holloway at UFC 329 on July 11 in Las Vegas.

Source: espn.com