Strikeforce cagefighting champion Nick Diaz is only 26 years of age, but the young Stockton California native has fought in almost every legit MMA promotion there is, including a three-year, 10-fight stint with the biggest and best one, the UFC.
All his matches have been tremendously entertaining, the best one possibly being the “news reel-style” knockout win over a heavily favored Robbie Lawler at UFC 47 in April of ‘04.
Diaz, in my opinion, is one of the top “pound for pound” fighters in the world today, and the eldest of the two fighting siblings was recently in Las Vegas to race in the Xterra Triathlon, an “iron man” contest; but first he spoke with yahoo.com Maggie Hendricks about Saturday night’s brawl, and also who he would like to fight next.
“I didn’t see it until he was already in Jake’s face. He pushed Jake, and then he just runs back at all of us. Everybody’s like, “Oh, you jumped this guy, you fought this guy,” but I didn’t know we were hitting him, because I was getting hit and people were grabbing me,” said Diaz.
” And If you watch the tape, this guy backs up really quick and then runs at all of us. I think maybe he got punched on a little bit, and pushed some at first, but he’s the one that ran up and got in Jake’s face. Gilbert pushes him back a little bit, then he pushes Gilbert, then he runs back at everyone, and everyone’s fighting. It wasn’t really that anyone intended on doing that.”
” I was just there to corner. I did my job. I was protecting myself. If you’re a fighter, what martial arts is going to teach you is that if you’re in a fight, you’re in a fight. You can’t just get hit on and stand there and get hit.” Diaz stated.
Diaz is scheduled to fight Hayato Sakurai at DREAM fight promotion in May, but was asked by Hendricks who is next for him in Strikeforce?
“I want to fight Jason, but I’m not going to talk shit on him, but if I was, I’d call him a little bitch, but I don’t really talk shit. That’s the only fight I want to talk about. Whoever they put in front of me, of course I’m going to fight them. I’m not afraid of anyone. Money talks. I’ll fight whoever they want. I’d rather a fight at a different weight and fight someone who was important, someone who has the title.”
” They ( Strike force) don’t have anybody in mind for me. My last fight, they had to bring that guy from [DREAM].
Diaz then commented about the current UFC’s 170 pound French-Canadian champion Georges St. Pierre:
“People always talk about Georges St. Pierre, and they say, “Why would he come down to fight you?” And I say, “Whoa, whoa. Let’s talk about GSP.” said Diaz
“He fought Dan Hardy, who got there by beating a guy my brother [UFC fighter Nate Diaz] just beat up. I was asked to fight Dan Hardy, and I turned down that fight because the guy isn’t popular and he isn’t important. He’s not that good. He gets to the UFC, and he punches out Mike Swick. I don’t have anything bad to say about Mike Swick, but I’ve never been impressed with Mike Swick. That’s all the UFC has over there is Mike Swick. That’s all they have to offer GSP?”
” [Thiago Alves] is there but he is having head trauma problems, and I’ve never been impressed with him either. Matt Hughes is old, and Karo Parisyan is good, but he fell off. I felt bad for him. ”
“The UFC has all new guys. These guys don’t even deserve to fight me, they don’t deserve to fight for a title. That’s why I’m talking about, hey, we should put [GSP vs. Diaz] together,” reinforced Diaz
“GSP’s fought everybody else. He’s already fought Jon Fitch and Josh Koscheck. He doesn’t want to fight those guys again. He should want to fight me.”
“I think he should stand up and say, whether this fight is going to happen or not, I’m not afraid to fight. I’m just trying to say, people should want to see that fight because this is ridiculous.”
” I’m trying to be a fighter and get my fights. “
This would indeed be a great match up in my opinion, both guys are black belts jju jujitsu specialists, and Diaz isn’t the easiest guy to get off his feet, he uses a long south paw jab and pummels his opponents with combos, to keep them at bay.
Due to the fact that both these men are employed by different fight company’s, this match-up is likely to never materialize, but it was interesting just the same, to hear Diaz call GSP out.
Since they now have two champions who are bred,after thoroughly cleaning out their respective weight divisions, maybe this is an idea whos time has come.
Dana White and the UFC aren’t quite able to have the true monopoly they desire, so maybe they could entertain the idea about holding 1 fight cross-promotion PPV deals.
That is,.. if they truly want to have the the bragging rights to back up their proclamation that they have the worlds greatest fighters.
by Cage Stoker
Tags: 47, Alves, brawl, Dan, Dana, Diaz, Dream, Fitch, Georges, Gilbert, GSP, Hardy, Hayato, Hughes, iron man, Jake, Jon, Josh, Karo, Koscheck, Lawler, Matt, Melendez, Mike, MMA, Nick, Parisyan, PPV, Robbie, Sakurai, Shields, St. Pierre, Strikeforce, Swick, Thiago, Triathlon, ufc, white, Xterra