Daniel Cormier, a former training partner of ex-UFC champ Khabib Nurmagomedov, says that Conor McGregor 'absolutely crossed the line' in his since-deleted tweet in which he referenced the passing of the Russian star's father.
There's an old saying in the fight game which states that "all is fair in love and fight promotion" but this is a maxim which has repeatedly been tested by McGregor throughout much of his tenure in the UFC – and especially recently, when he again took aim at his heated rival online after Khabib had congratulated Poirier for his recent win against the Irishman.
Nurmagomedov, who defeated McGregor by fourth-round submission when they met in the cage in 2018, had told the American that "good always defeats evil, very happy for Dustin Poirier."
McGregor's response, when it came, was scornful even by his standards.
"Covid is good and father is evil?" wrote McGregor, before swiftly deleting the missive from social media – but not before the offending tweet was screen-grabbed by fans.
McGregor's tweet references the passing of Khabib's father and trainer Abdulmanap a little over a year a go, a man who has been pivotal not just in Khabib's ascent to a UFC title but for several other fighters whom he trained – including the red-hot Islam Makhachev.
It is the latest salvo fired by McGregor towards Khabib in a rivalry which has also seen him attack a bus transporting the fighter in New York, and a tirade of various insults aimed at Khabib and his personal life.
And as far as Daniel Cormier is concerned, a line has very much been crossed.
"I get shock value and I get trying to get people to talk but way too far," Cormier said via ESPN.
"To the point that I immediately called Khabib last night and said, ‘Are you OK?’ Asking him if he’s OK after having to see that, especially with no ability to do anything about it again.
"He spoke to my kids at my wrestling program the other day and said he was never happier than when he got to fight McGregor on the day. Because for so long, he wanted to get his hands on Conor and beat Conor up.
"Well, he can’t do that no more cause he’s not a prizefighter anymore. So now he just has to kind of swallow that. Way too far. Honestly, when Conor does stuff like that, it’s hard to understand how there’s still this mass amount of people that support that type of behavior."
Cormier also admitted that some of the trash-talk ahead of this month's third fight between McGregor and Poirier also left a bad taste in his mouth, particularly after the contrast of McGregor's supposed peacemaking efforts which surrounded their fight last January.
"After the fight with Dustin Poirier, a lot of people questioned whether or not Conor McGregor was reaching to try and get in the head of Dustin Poirier,” Cormier added.
"Reach back to a time where he had trash talk that could affect people. It didn’t seem to work against Poirier. I feel like from him talking about Dustin’s wife to now Khabib’s father, he is just taking it way too far.
"When you’re dealing with death and Covid and all these other things that we’ve dealt with over the last year and a half, that’s all off limits. We talked about wives and families being off limits, but when you’re talking about a man’s everything – Khabib’s dad was his everything – and you’re talking about him being gone today due to something that has been so terrible for our entire world, you use that in a sense to get back?"
Also on rt.com ‘DISGUSTING’: Conor McGregor appalls fans with tweet targeting UFC rival Khabib & dead fatherFurthermore, Cormier suggests that McGregor's social media trolling can be explained simply: it is a cry for help from a fighter who is becoming aware that his powers are waning in a sport which is so close to his own personal identity.
"Absolutely crossed the line," Cormier declared. "I think when stuff like that is being said, it’s a cry for help. Conor has all the money in the world, he has all the fame, but now when you start to dig at that level, it’s like somebody needs to get to McGregor and help him to start to kind of re-shift his mind and his focus and get him back to a better place. It’s unfortunate."