{"id":39610,"date":"2026-07-30T05:38:06","date_gmt":"2026-07-30T05:38:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.sherdog.com\/news\/news\/Rival-coach-says-Conor-McGregor-didnt-look-like-himself-before-UFC-329-202141"},"modified":"2026-07-30T05:38:06","modified_gmt":"2026-07-30T05:38:06","slug":"rival-coach-says-conor-mcgregor-didnt-look-like-himself-before-ufc-329","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/rival-coach-says-conor-mcgregor-didnt-look-like-himself-before-ufc-329\/","title":{"rendered":"Rival coach says Conor McGregor didn\u2019t look like himself before UFC 329"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
<\/div>\n

Javier Mendez believes something was off with Conor
\nMcGregor<\/a> before the Irishman\u2019s
\nUltimate Fighting Championship<\/a> return against Max
\nHolloway<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The
\nAmerican Kickboxing Academy<\/a> head coach claimed McGregor\u2019s
\ndemeanor seemed \u201codd\u201d before the fight and questioned whether the
\nformer two-division champion was already dealing with an injury
\nbefore entering the cage.<\/p>\n

\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Javier Mendez breaks down Conor McGregor\u2019s unusual demeanor
\nbefore the Max Holloway fight<\/h2>\n

McGregor injured his ACL and meniscus with the very first kick he
\nthrew at Holloway. He was unable to plant both feet while throwing
\nstrikes and repeatedly fell, prompting an anticlimactic referee
\nstoppage. Since then, speculation has grown about whether McGregor
\nentered the fight already compromised, with footage of him
\nappearing hesitant while removing his shoes during the pre-fight
\ninspection adding fuel to the debate.<\/p>\n

Mendez recently weighed in, claiming that something about the Irish
\nsuperstar\u2019s walkout looked off.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Conor that we saw was different,\u201d Mendez said in an interview
\nwith NewBettingSites<\/a>. \u201cThe first thing that got me
\nwas his mohawk and I was like, \u2018What?\u2019 That struck me as a little
\nodd. But then he didn\u2019t have that relaxed swagger.\u201d<\/p>\n

The veteran coach also pointed towards McGregor\u2019s body language
\nduring the walkout and pre-fight moments, noting that the usual
\nconfidence associated with the former champion appeared absent.
\nMendez also recalled that McGregor had been practicing kicks
\nbackstage without any visible issues, which made his injury even
\nmore baffling.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe was in the back room throwing the same kick, and he had no
\nproblem, zero problem with it,\u201d Mendez said. \u201cBut then he goes to
\nthe walkout, takes his shoes off and you notice there was something
\nwrong there. Who knows? Did he hurt himself on that kick, or did he
\nhurt himself in the warm-up? Only his team knows the answer. All I
\nknow is that it wasn\u2019t him that I saw. He didn\u2019t look comfortable.
\nHe looked very tense.\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Javier Mendez believes something was off with Conor McGregor before the Irishman\u2019s Ultimate Fighting Championship return against Max Holloway. The American Kickboxing Academy head coach claimed McGregor\u2019s demeanor seemed \u201codd\u201d before the fight and questioned whether the former two-division champion was already dealing with an injury before entering the cage. Advertisement Javier Mendez breaks down […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":39611,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[150],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-39610","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-martial-arts-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39610","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39610"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39610\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/39611"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39610"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39610"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39610"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}