Middleweight boxer Jason Quigley was on the couch for Saturday AM on TV3 this morning. The Donegal fighter was speaking about his return to the ring having beat Daniel Rosario last Saturday in Boston after being out for a year with a broken hand.
The fighter spoke also openly about his use of social media, revealing how the images he posts online can sometimes be in stark contrast to his real feelings:
A lot of people out there will look at social media and at pictures of me winning fights in all these places and it looks amazing and they think it’s such great life.
But the next day, maybe I was sitting in the apartment on my own crying, missing family, missing home. It’s not all glamorous, sunshine and rainbows.
Quigley was asked about McGregor's recent rampage and the boxer made a key point about how McGregor is perceived by his younger fans especially in regards to social media:
The amount of young children and the amount of people that are looking up to the man. Whatever he touches, whatever he wears, whatever he smells like young kids want to be that. I think it's a disgrace to be honest, what he's done right now. There's going to be kids looking at that thinking, 'this is cool now, this is the way to act'. Young kids look at social media as a popularity thing, a cool kind of thing and McGregor's getting all the spotlight, but for the wrong reasons.
The 26-year-old did praise McGregor for what he has done for the sport of MMA in the country but believes that the former lightweight champion has "let himself down big time".
Quigley's comments about both his own use of social media and McGregor's make for an interesting comparison and whether McGregor's actions on Thursday were a way to keep himself in the news or a display of empty bravado, his need to remain in the headlines is beginning to alienate a lot of his fans.
McGregor was released on bail yesterday and will return for his day in court in New York on the 14th of June to face three charges of assault and one of criminal mischief.
