UFC star Nate Diaz will make his long-awaited return to the Octagon on Aug. 17 when he faces Anthony Pettis at UFC 241 in Anaheim.
By then it will have been almost three years since we lost saw him fight and fans can’t wait to see one of the biggest names in the fight game back doing his thing in the cage.
On Monday, Diaz appeared on Ariel Helwani’s MMA Show on ESPN and talked about his return, which will be at 170 pounds, and why he’s done fighting in the lightweight (155) division.
Diaz, of course, submitted Conor McGregor at UFC 196 and then lost a close decision to McGregor in their rematch at UFC 202, both of which were then record PPVs for the UFC.
He talked about his decision to leave the 155s behind:
Diaz touched upon how he slapped lightweight champ Khabib Nurmagomedov at a World Series of Fighting event back in 2015.
From our friends at MMAJunkie:
“The reason why he got slapped was because he was not humble and not this nice guy,” Nate Diaz said. “He was sitting there with his friends trying to get a fight with me, taking a picture with me, making fun of me. So I capitalized and told him, ‘(Expletive) you,’ and I slapped him in his face, and he was spooked for his life.
“His whole team, nobody did (expletive). I had Kron Gracie with me, and they had two on 15. And that whole Russian team thought they were hard to everyone else, but they were scared when that happened.”
It’s great to have Nate Diaz back.
You can watch his complete interview right here:
