This is a tough one.
Sadly, one of Conor McGregor's biggest fans won't be able to see him compete this weekend at UFC 189.
Last month McGregor became close with a 14-year-old Irish teen battling leukemia named Brendan McGlone.
"What happened was I got a phone call from a person in the UFC, someone from the Make-A-Wish Foundation reached out to them," McGregor told TSN Wednesday. "This kid from Ireland, he has leukemia and it was his final wish. I don't know. They were saying, 'This is probably his last wish and his last wish is to talk on the phone to you.'
"I rang the kid and we talked for a long, long time. I talked with his friends in the hospital, his family."
During the call, McGregor promised Brendan he'd fly home after UFC 189 to visit him in the hospital, championship belt in tow.
"Conor was a great inspiration and said all the greats have faced a great battle in their life and that's what I'm doing now," Brendan told the Irish Mirror in June. "He has offered to come meet me when he's back in Ireland with his belt."
On July 6, Brendan's family announced that the teen had passed.
"Today or last night he passed away and it f***ed my head up," said McGregor. "This little kid is in Ireland and I'm telling the kid, 'I'm going to take this belt and bring the belt to you and we'll raise the belt.' I would have done it. I would have flown him out to Las Vegas. They were thinking if maybe he got a little bit better we could fly him out to Vegas.
"It's just a really sad situation. It's heartbreaking. I've lost family members to cancer and it's a horrible, horrible thing. I wish ... I don't know. It would have been nice if I could have maybe ... I don't know."
McGregor faces Chad Mendes July 11 for the interim featherweight title at UFC 189 in Las Vegas, Nevada.
