Nate Diaz has claimed the UFC was looking to line him up for a trilogy fight against Conor McGregor, and reveals why he turned down the bout in favor of fighting Mike Perry on the Rousey vs. Carano event on Netflix instead.
It’s a long story, but in essence Diaz claims that he’d feel bad beating up his old rival McGregor given that he’s not fought since he broke his leg back in 2021.
Instead, Diaz wanted to fight Charles Oliveira for the ‘BMF’ title, but it doesn’t seem like the UFC wanted that fight right away. And so, while Diaz claims the UFC made him a competitive offer financially to return to the Octagon, he instead opted to sign up to fight Mike Perry on Netflix’s debut MMA event.
Read below for Diaz’s full thoughts on the matter, and how he still thinks the McGregor could happen in the future.
“I think that if I went back to UFC, they want me to fight Conor McGregor right now,” Diaz said on Theo Vonn’s ‘This Past Weekend’ podcast.. “For me, Conor McGregor just—Pull up his record, do we got his record? I know this, but I’m thinking about it, I’m like, Conor McGregor just f*cking lost to [Dustin] Poirier. He got knocked out on his ass… so Poirier knocks his ass out and then he breaks his leg, which is horrible because Poirier’s a sorry little bitch. I’m like, he knocks him out and then he gets his leg broken and it’s like, ‘F*ck, that’s f*cking horrible.’ We’re adversaries, but I’m like, ‘Bro, you broke your whole sh*t.’ I don’t wish that on nobody.
“Then I’m like, I hope he comes back and does good. Then everybody’s counting him out, I’m like, alright, cool. I know he’s having a hard time with the UFC because I’ve been having a hard time with the UFC. I’m like, ‘Yo, good vibes, damn, handling your sh*t.’“
“In the meantime, I’m doing whatever I’m doing, and then when [McGregor] is ready to come back now and he’s motivated and doing what he’s got to do and I’m like, ‘OK, I want to fight motherf*cking BMF motherf*cker who’s claiming my belt that’s running all around,’” Diaz continued. “Charles Oliveira just won the fight. You’re rocking my belt now and you’re running around like you’re the baddest motherf*cker, so that’s where I’m like, what’s popping with the UFC, let’s link up and get this fight popping. I go back to talk to them about it and they’re all ready for me to come back and fight Conor. I’m like, ‘Whoa, whoa, whoa, listen to what I’m talking about.’
“I want to fight the best of the best when they are the best of the best. Conor’s great, but I’m not trying to go kill off Conor when he’s on his last dying f*cking leg, literally. That’s f*cked up. I’m not trying to be the ending to some f*cker’s story like that. We ain’t friends, we ain’t none of that, but I ain’t trying to finish this dude off. That’s what I plan on doing if we’re fighting. At the same time, I ain’t trying to get f*cked up by nobody who just got knocked out on his ass and broke his leg, this guy’s down and out, now he’s nothing but motivated to fight me because who else are you going to fight in there? They’re probably going to give him a f*cking BMF belt, f*cking bitch-ass Oliveira, who I believe I’ll beat the f*cking shit out of.”
“[The UFC is] like, ‘OK, we want you to come back and maybe later we’ll do that. I’m like, OK, well, you know who’s doing a good job? Close to the same amount offer for Mike Perry, who’s the f*cking most violent motherf*cker around right now. Doing things, taking over business, running shit, doing his own promotion. I’m a lot more enthusiastic to get up and run and get ready to train for this motherf*cker who’s going to knock me out or I’m going to knock his ass out and we’re going to take who’s the bigger dog and the best motherf*ckers there are.“
So Diaz will fight Perry for now, but it seems the door is still open for him to return to the UFC in the future, and he still believes that the trilogy fight with McGregor will happen eventually.
“Me and Conor will fight again when the time is right, and it’s to fight, but it’s going to be when we both on the uprising. Not when someone’s dying out. I’m nobody’s comeback story either, so I’m fighting the most dangerous, most violent motherf*ckers there is on Netflix and then I’m hunting his boy that he works with at MVP. So that’s what I’m doing right now. That’s my objective and that’s what I’m doing. I didn’t want to talk about it, but that’s what’s happening.”
