Nick Diaz was not arrested over the weekend, despite a tweeted photo that hinted at the possibility.
That’s according to Diaz‘s trainer, Cesar Gracie, who in a wide-ranging interview Monday on The MMA Hour broadcast with host Ariel Helwani denied the fighter was arrested in the wake of his loss Saturday to welterweight champ Georges St-Pierre at UFC 158.
Gracie did not deny that Diaz interacted with police in the manner depicted on Twitter and elsewhere, but did say he believed the fighter was not in any actual trouble.
“No, not that I know of,” Gracie said when asked if Diaz was arrested. “Maybe someone picking him up at the airport or something got pulled over, but he’s fine…It’s not a big deal.”
These are heady times for the UFC’s biggest head case. Following his loss to St-Pierre, Diaz continued to make headlines. He seemed to announce his retirement (again) in the cage following the loss, but shortly thereafter at the UFC 158 post-fight press conference called for a rematch with St-Pierre, as well as a superfight with middleweight champ and pound-for-pound kingpin Anderson Silva.
In the interview, Gracie said he was not putting a great deal of stock in Diaz‘s comments, which came immediately after the adrenaline fest that typically constitutes a professional cage fight. However, he did say that Diaz was most interested in big fights, and may not be as motivated to face lower-profile opponents.
“I never listen to anybody after a fight,” Diaz said. “The emotional level is so high after a fight. And there’s so many things that you’re thinking in a different way than what you’re going to think the day after a fight or the week after a fight.
“He wants big fights,” Gracie said. “Like, guys in the news that people are talking about. He wants big fights to motivate himself.”
Diaz also admitted at the post-UFC 158 news conference, unprompted, that he has never paid taxes.
On the heels of that drama, late in the weekend came a photo from Diaz‘s Twitter account apparently showing Diaz being detained by police. The tweet was later deleted, but the photo remained accessible on the web.
Diaz (27-9-1) lost a bid for the UFC’s interim welterweight championship against Carlos Condit in February 2012. He was then suspended for a year after testing positive for marijuana metabolites.
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