Are You Not Entertained?

Last year, the swaggering former plumber Conor McGregor became the first UFC FIGHTER to hold two belts at once. The thrilling brutality of his knockouts— along with his notorious trash talk and lavish tastes— has made him into a phenomenon, THE RARE ATHLETE WHO IS BIGGER THAN HIS SPORT. We caught up with McGregor and met a man at war: with his league, with Floyd Mayweather, and, most of all, with himself.

- Zach Baron

Yesterday, Conor McGregor spent $27,000 at a Dolce & Gabbana store in Los Angeles, and then he did what he usually does after he spends $27,000 somewhere: He went for coffee, to give the store time to pack up all the things he just bought. “That’s a common occurrence for me nowadays,” he says. His handlers and his friends have grown used to the waiting. Spending that much money, they’ve learned, requires patience.

So anyway, he’s waiting, and then he gets a call from the store, and then another call, because the overwhelmed sales staff keep finding stuff in the pile that they forgot to add to the bill—a pair of shoes, a pocket square—and now they keep sheepishly calling back to ask if they can run Conor’s card again. Now, I don’t know Conor McGregor super well yet—we’ve only just met when he tells me this story—but my advice to the luxury-goods salespeople of America and Europe would be: Don’t do this. McGregor’s chosen method of communication does not involve the shrill international tone of disappointed privilege. He is not going to ask to speak to a manager. “I break orbital bones,” he says, trying to explain to me what he’s talking about, rolling the word “orbital” around in his mouth like a particularly zesty lozenge. Like it’s the next county over from Crumlin, the unlovely Irish suburb he grew up in. “I’m dropping $27,000. It’s about my eighth time in the last week. And you can’t drop, like, a pocket square in? Are you fucking serious?!” He’s not looking for anything for free, he says. Just a measure of respect.