Nate Diaz gets the call to fight McGregor

neither does conor.

 

Diaz isn't winning. They had to have it at 170 because he's completely out of shape taking this fight on such late notice.

 

This fight is unpredictable, I don't understand why people think it's an easy fight for Conor.

It will be the first time in the UFC that Conor fights a guy who has:

1) reach advantage

2) size advantage

3) southpaw stance

4) solid boxing skills for MMA, uses distance and counter strikes

5) great submission grappling and actively goes for submissions with 12 submission victories in his career - people say that he doesn't have the wrestling but Nate has good throws from the clinch and in a 5 round fight it's likely that the fight hits the ground at some point eventually, this is MMA after all.

6) "don't give a ****" attitude towards Conor's trash talk. Mental games don't seem to work here.

7) great chin... He won't crack like Aldo and Mendes. He could go the distance and Conor has not fought for full 5 rounds before.

Those are 7 intriguing questions that Conor has not answered yet on this level. He hasn't fought anyone like that before. I'm beginning to think Conor is buying his own hype at this moment.

 

It doesn't mean he's out of shape. This was Conor's idea. Nate Diaz was essentially bargaining. Out of shape or not, fight at 170 is better for him than anything lower. He's simply a bigger and heavier man than Conor. Even if he's in shape it's in his best interest to fight at a higher weight so why not just claim that you can't make anything lower than 165 to get what you want? It's basically like catchweights in boxing. It's a short notice fight and the less time he spends on weight cut the better for him.

I wouldn't be surprised if he was actually preparing for this even before RDA cancelled.

 

This.

I've got Diaz winning it.

Not out of shape...Durable...Size advantage...Southpaw with good boxing...Vastly superior in the clinch and on the ground.

I don't think McGregor can stop Diaz. McGregor has been dominating guys who are orthodox, smaller, and not necessarily good boxers. Diaz is none of those things, so I see it going the distance if Diaz doesn't sub him. And as you pointed out, over 5 it's going to the ground at some point.

I'd probably place a small bet on Diaz by submission.

P.S.
In a same-stance fight the jab becomes more important...Conor is good at using the lead hand as a setup, but Diaz is definitely better with the jab and hook. I really don't see Conor finding a home for the straight left, and even if he does Nate will take it much differently than a featherweight.

 

He is not the naturally bigger or heavier fighter, he's just longer. Diaz is a natural LW that doesn’t have time to train much less to even attempt a weight cut.

 

He's a big LW, Conor would be an average LW.

Nate Diaz fought at WW with the likes of Rory MacDonald who would probably throw Conor out of the cage. Don't buy the hype, Conor has no business at 170 and would be ragdolled by anyone who'd grapple with him.

It would also be physically impossible for Nate Diaz to make the FW.

He is the heavier man especially after Conor just had a weight cut to 145 in december and had multiple difficult weight cuts over the last two years.

Nate walks around at 180 while Conor recently admitted that he's bellow the 170 limit even when eating normally and packing some muscles.

 

Conor walked around in the mid/ high 170s during his FW ufc run and he's close to 180 for this fight. He's a natural WW who cut around 30 pounds to beat up on guys two weight classes below him. Even against a fairly large FW like Mendes who cuts 15-20 pounds to make the FW limit he looked like the much bigger man. With the IV bans/ strict peds testing he'll never make FW ever again. Diaz on the other hand is a tall lanky guy who doesn't cut a significant amount of weight to make 155.

 

Read this thread I had diaz winning since day 1

 

:deal

 

:think

 

:good

 

Great call.

 

Good call