Carl Frampton open to fighting an MMA star

Carl Frampton certainly doesn’t believe Floyd Mayweather v Conor McGregor was bad for boxing.

The Belfast featherweight gave ‘The Notorious’ more of a chance than most against Mayweather, flew out to Las Vegas to attend the fight, and was extremely complimentary towards McGregor afterwards.

After the fight at the T-Mobile Arena, Frampton tweeted that “we all know he can fight but if he can learn to adapt to 12 rounds Conor will be a very good boxer. A lot of millions richer. Happy days.”

Indeed ‘The Jackal’ believes that McGregor may have kicked off a new trend with his move across from mixed martial arts to boxing and envisions other MMA fighters crossing codes for big fights in the future.

Liverpudlian cruiserweight Tony Bellew has already spoken of his desire for a fight with Manchester’s UFC middleweight champ Michael Bisping – while UFC heavyweight champion Stipe Miocic has been campaigning for a fight with WBA and IBF heavyweight champ Anthony Joshua in recent months.

Frampton himself is open to the possibility of locking horns with a mixed martial artist, and outlined his thoughts in his weekly column for the Sunday Life.

The Tiger’s Bay 30 year old described how “the attention that this [Mayweather v McGregor] has brought to boxing across the world is incredible.”

“I can see more fights between boxers and MMA fighters in the future and if the money was right and it make sense, I would fight an MMA guy but it would have to be in the ring, not the octagon.”

Frampton campaigns at featherweight in boxing – 126lbs – which is closest to the MMA/UFC flyweight class of 125lbs. The current UFC champion, and the pound-for-pound #1 fighter in the sport, Demetrious Johnson.

Flyweight was also home to retired Irish fighter Paddy Holohan, who cause controversy last week when he claimed that boxing was “full of bullies” and that “boxing is checkers, UFC or MMA is chess.”