The past 12 months didn’t exactly do wonders for Conor McGregor’s MMA career, but he had plenty of other reasons to remain in good spirits.
To put it another way, his ranking atop a new list of highest-paid athletes can be distilled down to his outside-the-Octagon pursuits.
That’s because the time McGregor has spent moonshining … er, moonlighting as a whiskey entrepreneur has recently paid off in a big way. He was able to sell his stake in the company that produces bottles of Proper No. Twelve as part of a $150 million deal in March.
That pushed the Irishman to a properly impressive No. 1 perch in Forbes’ latest list of highly successful sports figures, which was published on Wednesday. McGregor was credited with earnings of $180 million from May 1, 2020, to May 1 of this year.
Of that total, $22 million came from his one fight over the past year, a January loss to Dustin Poirier via second-round TKO. That gave McGregor as many losses as wins in his past six UFC bouts, dating back to March 2016.
