Conor McGregor, Proper Irish Whiskey, Artem Lobov, lawsuit

Conor McGregor is facing a lawsuit from a close friend that could amount to millions of dollars.

The Irish Independent is reporting that Artem Lobov, a retired fighter who was once a training partner of McGregor’s, is suing the UFC star over a substantial amount in unpaid proceeds from the sale of McGregor’s Proper No. 12 Irish whiskey brand.

McGregor, his agent Audie Attar and third partner Ken Austin sold their Irish whiskey company to Proximo Spirits, the owner of Jose Cuervo, amongst other liquors, for $600 million ($A891m) in 2021.

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Lobov has said previously, in an interview with Talksport, that he was behind the idea for the whiskey brand — and that he talked McGregor into doing Irish whiskey instead of a vodka — and put together the deal with a whiskey distillery.

“The selling point of my book will be the Proper 12 Whiskey story. A few people know, but this was actually my idea. I was the person who came up with the idea to do a whiskey for Conor,” Lobov said.

“Once the deal was ready, I went to Conor and I said, ‘Conor, I have the deal ready for you. This is going to be a billion-dollar deal, no messing here.’ I’m not sure if he took me seriously or not at the time with the billion dollars. We continued working on it and as you can see it was a massive success. I’m really happy to see that and I’m really happy to be a part of it.”

The Independent reports that Lobov plans to claim in court that he is entitled to 5 percent of McGregor’s proceeds. Lobov said in the Talksport interview that he was offered $1 million by McGregor, but turned it down.

This story originally appeared on the New York Post.