To understand just how big Conor McGregor has become, how important he is to Ireland, how vital his ascent is to the continued rise of the UFC, consider the line of people that formed outside the MGM Grand Garden Arena at 9am on Friday to watch a weigh-in.
A weigh-in.
And not just a weigh-in, but a weigh-in that wouldn’t happen for six more hours.
When UFC employees reported to the MGM Grand not long after sunrise to prepare for the 3pm weigh-in, they were stunned to see hundreds of people draped in Irish flags waiting to get in. Within hours, the line had grown into the thousands until it snaked through the arena lobby, down the sidewalk, around the casino and out on to Las Vegas Boulevard; all to catch two minutes of their idol strip to his shorts, stand on a scale, flex his biceps and disappear.
For this this stood for the bulk of Friday. And they drank. And they sang. And they showed – as if it needed to be exposed – that this wiry, cocksure man with a chest of elaborate tattoos might be about the most important figure in any fighting today. Anyone who lures thousands to stand an entire day just to see him bound onto a scale has a magic appeal like no one else.
And when McGregor finally appeared on the huge stage with the giant video screen looming above, they roared as if Saturday’s UFC 194 against José Aldo had already been won. He disrobed slowly, dropping his clothes with delicate ease as if this was some kind of elaborate striptease. He ascended the scale, watched the number hit 145lbs (same as for Aldo) clenched his fist and thrust it into the air. He pursed his lips. He looked around. Then he nodded. On an afternoon before a full card of appealing fights, the sport seemed at that moment to only be about him.
“I will kill you,” he hissed at Aldo when this fight was announced months ago. Whatever he said this time was drowned in the roar of the thousands who waited hours just to see him stand on this stage. When the man with the microphone asked Aldo to speak, the crowd silenced him with choruses of “olé, olé, olé.” When UFC president Dana White tried to gather Aldo and McGregor for the traditional fighter’s pose the two men started to scuffle. The crowd howled.
But White quickly separated them. The fighters left the stage and the crowd – estimated to be 9,500 – filed out of the arena.
Only they didn’t really go. It wasn’t enough to leave Conor McGregor behind. Nine thousand fans did not stand on Las Vegas Blvd for hours just to see their hero strip to his underwear. They came for a celebration. And so, on a day when all McGregor did was stand on a scale and clench his fist, the poured through the doors of the MGM Grand Garden Arena and began an impromptu riot.
They surged into the MGM’s food court, thousands of them waving their flags and pumping their fists. A woman sat at a table inside Blitz Frozen Desserts with a hand over her mouth as her two young children and husband watched with mouths agape as the mob held drinks aloft and sang “olé, olé, olé.”
A couple dressed as elves, sipping drinks at a daiquiri bar pressed against a corridor wall as the McGregor army stormed past singing Yellow Submarine.
Outside the Misura store, a McGregor fan became so overcome singing Winter Wonderland that he took his drink and dumped it on his head. The rest of the crowd moved on past.
The shouted in front of Starbucks and roared under a sign advertising jeans that read: “Wrangler – long live Cowboys.” They pushed past Nathan’s Famous Hot Dogs, Häagen-Dazs and Hexx Confections and toward the actual casino itself.
At the mouth of the casino, several young men jumped on the slot machines, bobbing up and down as the mob sang The Fields of Athenry, then broke into a singing of “Graffiti on the Walls.” And as yellow shirted security officers scrambled to somehow control the surge of drunken, bellowing humanity swirling around jangling slot machines with names like “Cougar-licious” and “Walking Dead,” the crowd stopped. And a chant rose in the great room.
“Who the fuck is Aldo! Who the fuck is Aldo!”
The McGregor army laughed. The security guards looked flustered. Then, slowly, the mob surged forward again, moving toward the exit, toward Las Vegas Blvd, where its day had started so many hours before. And if nothing else, the stunned patrons of the MGM Grand at about 4pm on the day before UFC 194 knew something about how big Conor McGregor has become.
