Conor Vs Sanchez the fight that never happened

The landscape in the UFC was very different in 2014. The promotion was getting ready to organize its first card in Mexican territory while a star was quickly emerging from the other side of the Atlantic.

Those were times when Conor McGregor had the hunger of the prospects, he wanted to fight anywhere, against anyone and continue to advance his goal for the featherweight or lightweight title, which he also won in the UK promotion, Cage Warriors.

By the time Dana White signed him, he knew McGregor was special, pulling in all the fans in the Republic of Ireland and winning fans in the United States. In his first fights inside the octagon he beat the likes of Marcus Brimage and a certain Max Holloway, who would become a legend years later.

The big test came when he starred in Dublin. The atmosphere was unique and McGregor ended up overwhelming his opponent Brazilian Diego Brandao. It was time to take it to a PPV in Las Vegas.

So it happened at UFC 178 in September 2014 when he was matched up for the first time with Dustin Poirier. The relentless Conor at 145 pounds showed up that night and also intimidated the ‘Diamond’ who that night was finished and decided he would no longer fight at featherweight.

Almost a year earlier at UFC 166, two Mexican-born fighters, Gilbert Melendez and Diego Sanchez, stole the Latino night from Cain Velasquez in Houston. Although the heavyweight champion put on a tremendous fight against Junior Dos Santos to close out the trilogy between the two, Diego was on the verge of one of the most dramatic comebacks in history.

Melendez dominated the first two rounds, in which the exchange was constant and he always ran the risk of Diego’s ‘zombie mode’ catching up with him; that was the case in the third. After connecting with him on a couple of occasions, he sent him against the fence and looked to finish him. Sanchez saw an opportunity to land a mataleón that Gilbert defended well and ended up surviving.

The crowd at the Toyota Center went wild as the final bell rang and Diego was begging White from the top of the cage to give him one more round. In the excitement of the moment, the UFC president, who was still open-mouthed, probably would have given it to him if it was in his hands.

That was the Diego Sanchez of the second half of his career, who walked away from title fights like BJ Penn, but created a myth around him. Fans knew it was no longer just about scoring wins, but about the kind of fights he could put on.

That’s when the ‘hungry’ Conor saw an opportunity for promotion: “I was at a dinner in Las Vegas, days after the fight with Lorenzo Fertitta (former UFC owner) and Dana White and I told them I wanted to stay active, even if it was at 155 pounds. I wanted to fight before Christmas and there we realized that Diego had no opponent (Norman Parke was injured), I asked for the fight, Lorenzo liked the idea, but Dana did not,” said McGregor in an interview days after UFC 180, the first event in Mexico City.

The ‘Notorious’ did not care much about the will of his promoter and decided to announce it on October 2: “I will fight Diego in Mexico on November 15, he has talked about more and now he will pay with his career,” he wrote on his twitter account.

White countered by denying it and announcing Joe Lauzon as Sanchez’s opponent for that historic night.

But Conor was to insist: “I heard Lauzon was out and I asked again, I had already been told yes, but then Diego was the one who decided to come out.”

McGregor had his fight weeks later against Dennis Siver in Boston, with Jose Aldo in the front row and that first spontaneous face-off between the two.