He danced.
He taunted.
He landed with pinpoint accuracy at will.
If it sounds like I’m describing Stockton bad boy Nate Diaz, think again.
In his bout against Jeremy Stephens at UFC on Fuel 3, Donald Cerrone looked an awful lot like the man who last defeated him, the aforementioned Mr. Nathan Diaz.
Cerrone bobbed, weaved, skipped and taunted en route to a dominating unanimous decision victory, and all things considered, this fight looked awfully similar for Cerrone, albeit for opposite reasons.
At UFC 141 in December, Nate Diaz did exactly the same to him, and the Stockon native broke “The Cowboy’s” heart, face and fighter of the year campaign in the process.
So what does this say?
It says, first and foremost, Cerrone bettered himself through the loss to Diaz, so kudos to him for that.
More importantly, though, Cerrone’s bout against Stephens proved just how good Diaz really is.
If we had any doubt about the legitimacy of Diaz’ upcoming title fight, that doubt is now gone.
Cerrone was dominant in all aspects of the game against Stephens, and for somebody who had never seen a fight before, “The Cowboy” looked like a world beater.
But that isn’t the case, as Diaz so effectively proved in their December 2011 matchup.
Diaz dismantled Cerrone like nobody had before him, landing pinpoint punches and bloodying the face and spirit of his foe.
An aggressive fighter by nature, Cerrone was unable to mount any sort of offense, as Diaz’ attack left him completely on his heels and overwhelmed.
Cerrone has great striking, great wrestling, great cardio and great jiu-jitsu. There is not an area of the fight where you can always say, “Oh yeah, just get him there and he’ll struggle” because he’s that well rounded.
Diaz, however, made it look as though Cerrone was an amateur and had never fought before, a testament to just how good he really is.
If you need further proof of Nate Diaz’ legitimacy in the UFC lightweight division (and you shouldn’t after the Miller win, but I digress), look at how dominant Cerrone was tonight and remember how Diaz made him look like a child.
That is simply all you need to see.
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