In a sport built on feuding parties, there are some exchanges that go too far even for the UFC and its president Dana White.
On Tuesday night, former UFC two-division champion and recently retired Conor McGregor went on a tweet spree with several of his favorite targets, boxer Paulie Malignaggi and current UFC lightweight champion Khabib Nurmagomedov, as targets.
Among several now deleted tweets directed at Nurmagomedov’s teammates, McGregor went after Nurmagomedov’s wife, posting pictures of the two at their wedding with the caption “Your wife is a towel mate”. She was covered up as part of their religion.
Nurmagomedov’s manager Ali Abdelaziz and the champion himself fought back with several tweets of their own, culminating with Nurmagomedov posting a now infamous picture of McGregor with a woman that claims she had McGregor’s baby with the caption, “Rapist, you are Rapist. You are a hypocrite who is not responsible for your actions. Justice will find you. We will see.”
That prompted White to get involved as he made a statement via UFC.com Wednesday:
“I am aware of the recent social media exchange between Khabib Nurmagomedov and Conor McGregor. The ongoing situation has escalated to a level that is unacceptable. As such, we are taking the necessary steps to reach out to both athlete camps and this situation is being addressed by all parties internally.”
It’s unclear what those steps are, but Nurmagomedov is still on a Nevada Athletic Commission suspension for most of 2019 and McGregor is, as he says, retired.
McGregor and Nurmagomedov have been at odds for several years, erupting in April 2018 when McGregor and his team stormed a bus where Nurmagomedov and other fighters were on during a UFC media day. The Irishman threw a metal dolly through the window injuring several fighters. Nurmagomedov won their October clash via fourth round submission, but a brawl between both fighters’ camps erupted after the fight ended, resulting in the aforementioned suspensions.