In the persona, the character, and the promotion, it's probably lost on most people what competing means for Conor McGregor.
In the mistakes that a loose tongue and an increasing profile have brought about for him, it's easy to dismiss the drive that he has and the pure, raw dedication that he has to being the best.
Talking's all well and good but it will only get you by for a few fights until you're found out and tossed aside with nobody giving a shit anymore. This man has climbed to the very top, for the most part backing up his chit-chat on the way.
Anyone who watched the Dublner's new film, Notorious, will have seen not just the hunger that McGregor has every single day, but also the application. He wants it and he does it.
Things haven't just happened for him. They've happened because he wanted them to happen and he's spent every waking hour making them happen.
There was an amazing few shots in the documentary after he exacted revenge on Nate Diaz. He's on crutches leaving the stadium and over and over and over again he's repeating the words, "doubt me now".
48 hours later, he's back home and he's training again, pushing himself to the limits on an exercise machine before he picks up one crutch and hobbles off as his team around him laugh at the sheer craziness of the fire that burns inside him.
Four months after that, he had won a second world title in the UFC.
On The Late Late Show on Friday night, Conor McGregor revealed that more serious, analytical side he has as he discussed what he was thinking going into not just a different sport, but against the best in that sport.
Plain and simple, he thought he could win. He gave his ideas as to what he could've done better. He shrugged his shoulders as most men would when he was weighing up the challenge with the reward he got for it. What man wouldn't have done it?
But this man thought he could win along the way too.
https://twitter.com/RTELateLateShow/status/926597458922057728
