Last week, Paulie Malignaggi revealed that he was contacted by Conor McGregor's team, hoping the former world champion would spar with the UFC superstar to help prepare him for the upcoming boxing match against Floyd Mayweather Jr.
McGregor will swap the Octagon for the boxing ring on August 26 when he faces the undefeated Mayweather in what promises to be one of the most spectacular sporting occasions of the year.
Former two-weight world champion Malignaggi - who announced his retirement in March - claims to have been approached to aid McGregor's preparation for his first professional boxing fight.
Malignaggi called out McGregor last December, taunting the Irishman by saying: "I am going to knock the beard off you ... you are going to be apologising for everything you have been trying to do to get in the boxing ring."
Addressing his previous comments, Malignaggi said: "I did call him out and I think that shows the character of the man. He could have said 'screw that kid, he called me out - I'm not going to put him in my training camp'.
"I think it shows the competitive spirit and the willingness to want to learn on the part of McGregor. It shows you how hungry he is, because he put that pride aside and it's not easy to put pride aside, especially when you're a fighter. It makes me respect him a little more."
Malgnaggi is impressed with the mental strength of the MMA fighter.
“Conor’s a winner. You don’t get to this point in your life unless you’re a winner. And leading into the fight, I think Conor’s going to believe in himself a lot. He’s always been a guy who’s had extreme self-belief. It’s whether you can continue to believe in yourself in moments when it’s not going so great. That’s really where the inner character comes out, and it’s not easy," Malignaggi told UFC.com.
“One thing I told myself when I got to the highest level against Miguel Cotto was that this will be an opponent that even if I have certain moments, he will roar back. He’s not just going to accept the defeat. My other opponents, maybe they were easier to convince that they were getting beaten once they were getting beaten up. These types of opponents, you start beating them up and they’re not convinced that they’re going to get beat yet. As a matter of fact, they’re convinced that they’re going to turn the ship around.
“Conor has to have that kind of self-belief because the probability of him running into rough moments is very high in this fight, so he has to have that mental determination to navigate those rough moments without panicking, because panic only creates more errors.”