On three-year anniversary, Conor McGregor reflects on battles with Nate Diaz

Believe it or not, 2016 was the last year that former UFC featherweight and lightweight champion Conor McGregor has scored a victory in combat sports. His opponent for his second to most recent win was none other than Stockton, Calfornia’s finest, Nate Diaz.

However, that win came in the pairing’s second of two outings. The first coming just a few months prior when the two met at UFC 196 an entire years ago as of yesterday. A bout that saw Diaz pull off the upset on short notice via second-round submission (rear-naked choke).

For Diaz, he hasn’t fought since his encounters with McGregor whereas McGregor has had two lightweight title bouts with a boxing match mixed in. He would lose the most recent two of those three bouts to Floyd Mayweather and current lightweight king Khabib Nurmagomedov.

On the anniversary of what would end up being a historic date, the Irishman took some time to look back at the wars he had with his brash rival.

“What a sequence!
One of the craziest fights ever.
Also the birth of McGregor FAST!
The rematch was voted the greatest fight in UFC history.
My last one was a small bit wild also haha
I love this game.
This is my 3rd level of income at this point.
I just do it because I love it.

It’s fascinating to me watching that loss back. Then watching the come back.
We can always come back!
Anyone can do something once. It’s Can you do it twice is the question. That’s why I doubled up on the belts every time.
Any fool can do it once.” McGregor tweeted.

Whether or not we’ll ever see a trilogy bout between the two remains to be determined. But surely it would be a fight that the UFC would never say no to assuming both parties showed the interest for it.

This article first appeared on BJPenn.com on 3/6/2019