Malignaggi: Andre Berto cancelled plans to spar Conor McGregor after hearing controversies

Conor McGregor and Paulie Malignaggi have had a very public falling out after just a couple of weeks and two sparring sessions together. According to the former two-division boxing champ, Conor’s behavior here along with a similar controversy with Chris Van Heerden, has even cost him yet another high profile sparring partner.

Malignaggi claims that Andre Berto, a former opponent of Floyd Mayweather Jr. and a friend of McGregor, cancelled plans to work with the UFC champion because of the recent controversies.

“I spoke to Andre Berto. Andre was supposed to go there and box on Saturday, and he changed his mind after seeing what happened with me,” Malignaggi said on an appearance with Cagesiders. “Everybody already knew what happened with Van Heerden, now he’s doing the same with me too. When word goes around that somebody is like that, even in regular life, you start to alienate (people).”

According to Malignaggi, with both him and Van Heerden being subject to “spin”, it becomes obvious to many that it isn’t just a one-time mistake. He says this is why Berto rescinded his plans to help McGregor out in sparring, and this is why the fighter will have a hard time getting legitimate help from the boxing community moving forward.

“He’s going to have trouble getting any help in boxing, because the sneaky tactics, the sneaky qualities that he has now can no longer be looked at as a coincidence. With the Van Heerden situation, like maybe he didn’t know how the ethics work in boxing, maybe he still had to learn, or now that he has learned, everything will be okay.

“I think the cat’s out of the bag with Conor McGregor in boxing, now that he’s tried this again, with sneaky tactics,” he said. “You spar, and let me put in sneaky pictures, or make sneaky videos in Van Heerden’s case and let me spin it.”

Malignaggi says McGregor is already a massive star, and he never really needed to compromise his ethics and promote himself at the expense of others.

“I just don’t think it’s really necessary,” he explained. “Conor McGregor’s name was pretty big when he boxed Van Heerden. I think Conor McGregor’s name was pretty big when he sparred me, obviously. I don’t think he needed to spin that sparring into any direction to make his name bigger.

“There was no need to do that, but all it’s done is ruin his reputation. I don’t think he’ll be able to get big name help at any point in his boxing career. But at the end of the day, it was definitely something that has hurt his ability to work with contacts — or have contacts in boxing.”

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Game Recap: Jaguars take the first preseason against Patriots

The first preseason game for the Jacksonville Jaguars resulted in a win against the New England Patriots 31-24 in New England. Any game that win against a team that is coached by Bill Belichick can be considered a big win, especially when you’re the visiting team. This is a good start to Doug Marrone’s run as head coach of the Jaguars.

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The game started out tied at 3-3 up until Jaguars backup quarterback Chad Henne threw a 97 yard touchdown pass to receiver Keelan Cole to go up by seven. Cole finished the night with two receptions for 108 yards and one touchdown. Rookie running back Leonard Fournette scored his first career touchdown on a one yard run that put the Jaguars up by fourteen in the second quarter as well. Fournette didn’t see a lot of playing time, limiting him 31 rushing yards but he did get in the endzone.

A player who showed up big for the Jaguars was running back Corey Grant. He finished the night with 120 rushing yards and one touchdown. His biggest play of the night came in the third quarter when he put on the wheels and ran 79 yards for a touchdown. Grant had more rushing yards himself than the entire Patriots team as a whole.

Dede Westbrook also got himself some playing time, and enough of it to catch his first touchdown pass of his career. Quarterback Brandon Allen connected with Westbrook on a 42 yard touchdown pass that gave the Jaguars their final score of the night.

The defense did very well against the Patriots running game, only giving up a total 116 rushing yards. The passing defense will need some work, but they did just enough to help secure a win. Patriots quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo had himself a night throwing for 235 yards and two scores which gave the Jaguars trouble at certain points in the game.

With the Patriots out of the way, the Jaguars will now look to improve as they will take on the Tampa Bay Buccaneers next Thursday. This was definitely a confident boost for this young Jaguars team that is looking to show they can compete, and what better way to do it than defeat the defending Super Bowl champions? Even though this game won’t count in a couple weeks, atleast the Jaguars can build off of this win and keep getting better as a unit.

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