The headaches for Strikeforce just keep coming lately; 185lb. champ Jake Shields just worked over the promotion’s latest big name acquisition (Dan Henderson) and could be UFC bound, #1 P4P contender Fedor Emelianenko still isn’t locked up for his next fight, and of course, there was the whole ‘close your eyes little Jimmy” post fight brawl last Saturday….Now to make things even more complicated for the growing promotion, welterweight champion Nick Diaz hasn’t exactly been falling over himself lately, to promote the Strikeforce 170lb. division.
Diaz is set to fight Japanese veteran Hayato “Mach” Sakurai on May 29th, but in the meantime, that hasn’t stopped him from calling out Georges St. Pierre, who the Cesar Gracie fighter also believes is short on viable contenders. Speaking to Cage Writer recently, Diaz offered this statement, when asked about whether or not Strikeforce has any notable opponents for him:
“No, I don’t. That’s why I’m going to fight in Japan. They don’t have anybody for me. My last fight, they had to bring that guy from [DREAM]. 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.” 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.”
GSP vs. Diaz? We’d sure as hell watch, but somehow we think Shields might face the UFC champ first.