We’re less than one month away from UFC 158, where welterweight kingpin Georges St-Pierre will take on Nick Diaz in a fight we’ve been waiting almost eighteen months to see. At this point, it’s too late for a petty disagreement to cancel this fight. Nothing short of an act of God is going to stop this fight from finally happening, which is obviously great news when Nick Diaz is involved, because once again, Diaz has apparently been no-showing his media obligations.
At least that’s what Dana White had to say during the post-event press conference for yesterday’s UFC on FUEL TV 7. According to him, everyone’s favorite welterweight from the 209 hasn’t been showing up for Countdown tapings. This also explains why Nick Diaz vs. GSP didn’t get its own UFC Primetime episodes even though the much less interesting bout between Rousey vs. Carmouche did; Primetime requires much more effort from the fighters being profiled to film. As Dana White said yesterday (transcribed by MMAWeekly):
“Nick Diaz would be an interesting Countdown show, too,” White shot back
sarcastically, “if we could get him to show up for those.
“Imagine how good his Countdown show would be. You think his video blog would
be great? How about if he had a professionally shot, by professionals, the best
in the business, the best at cutting and producing features on athletes. Imagine
how (expletive) good that would be.”
“First we gotta get him to show up for the (expletive) interviews and then we
can do it. How many has he missed, four? Three. He’s missed three,” White
revealed.
“So we’ve got a crew rolling around Stockton not doing a (expletive) thing.
It costs us a lot of money and we can’t properly sell the fight or Nick Diaz.”
It’s disappointing that we won’t be getting any Countdown episodes where Nick Diaz drives around shouting at people in between chaotic, rambling tangents loosely related to his upcoming bout. Disappointing, but not even remotely surprising, because Nick Diaz has never been a media darling.
Except for one thing: According to the Nick Diaz camp, Nick hasn’t been blowing off the camera crews. Rather, Nick Diaz simply isn’t being told about the media obligations he apparently has. As Jonathan Tweedale – a lawyer with the Nick Diaz camp – told MMAWeekly.com:
“Dana is mistaken. There is no ‘crew rolling around Stockton’ and Nick did not ‘miss’ three interviews. In fact, several earlier dates were arranged without Nick’s knowledge and with no notice to Nick. When Nick learned what had happened, I assisted him in arranging a date and time directly (Thursday, Feb. 14). Nick arrived early and was in good spirits at that Feb. 14 date – the one and only date he knew about in advance. Nick requires things to be done in an organized and orderly manner. That is the kind of professional he is.”
Did someone just call Nick Diaz a “professional” in a non-sarcastic manner? There’s a first time for everything.
It isn’t up to me to determine who is telling the truth in this game of he said/he said. I will just say that when Nick Diaz is in full-blown Macho Man-esque ranting mode, he cuts the best interviews on the planet, and that part of me hopes that Nick Diaz defeats GSP simply for the headaches that UFC Welterweight Champion Nick Diaz will cause.
Who do you think is telling the truth here? Is Nick Diaz no showing his media obligations, because that’s what Nick Diaz does? Or is Dana White saving face for not promoting UFC 158 as much as fans would like? Let us know in the comments section. Keep it civil, guys.