Conor McGregor Calls Out ‘Biased’ Judges For Mayweather Scoring

Conor McGregor may have won the respect of many fans, fighters, and boxing purists alike when he appeared to have won some early rounds over all-time great Floyd Mayweather before getting stopped in the tenth round of their highly anticipated boxing match from Las Vegas last night, but apparently, two of the ringside judges didn’t see it that way.

In a picture of the official scorecards released by the Nevada Athletic Commission (NAC), judges Burt Clements and Guido Cavalleri both had McGregor winning just the first round, while third judge Dave Moretti gave McGregor a more realistic seeming first three. Obviously, it didn’t matter when the UFC star faded down the stretch and was finished in the championship rounds, but the scores of the first two judges would at least suggest a skew towards boxing.

At least that’s how McGregor saw it, as he dubbed Clements and Cavalleri’s scores ‘biased’ when he was notified of how the bout had been scored (via USA TODAY):

“I think that’s very biased. I am actually shocked at that. I thought I won first three clearly. The fourth could have gone either way. I thought I snuck out round eight, then he won nine and got the finish. I thought I did okay.”

Indeed he did better than okay, landing more punches on the notoriously elusive Mayweather than legendary boxer Manny Pacquiao did in their highly anticipated but ultimately lackluster ‘Fight of the Century’ a couple years back. Sure, he didn’t shock the world by knocking out arguably the best defensive boxer ever like he had promised to, but climbing into the ring to face one of a completely different sport’s all-time greats is a task few athletes – if any – have truly accomplished and not been completely embarrassed.

As for the fight’s result, well, McGregor probably knew he would most likely need a finish to beat Mayweather in Las Vegas, the city for which “Money” makes an almost unheard-of amount of just that, whether due to his own rapidly-emptying tank or the judges in place.

That’s not to say Mayweather didn’t certainly earn the victory, however; he did, and put on one of his most impressive performances in many years, even if it was against a UFC fighter. Overall, the judges were just more likely to be more familiar with Mayweather and boxing overall, so a bias towards that sport may have been baked in regardless.

What did you think? Was the scoring awry? Would it have turned out to be a huge controversy if McGregor had not faded down the stretch?