Nate Diaz made some headlines recently when the fighter walked out of a UFC press conference during a video announcing that UFC Lightweight Champion Khabib Nurmagomedov will face Conor McGregor at UFC 229.
Former UFC Women’s Bantamweight Champion Miesha Tate has had her issues with the UFC as well, which is why the former title holder understands why Diaz did what he did.
“I would feel the same way as Nate does,” Tate said on Fight Nation. “Nate has a different personality than I do, he’s expressive in a different way, but of course [I would be mad]. I remember when I threatened retirement because I was so pissed off that they had promised that I would fight Ronda and then they ended up switching that out and having Holly [Holm] but they didn’t tell me. It’s the same thing that happened to Nate, essentially, it’s just that Nate was in front of everybody. I was pissed too, believe me.”
Diaz is expected to be back in action at UFC 230, facing Dustin Poirier in a lightweight division affair.
While Tate does sympathize with Diaz, one thing she cannot figure out is exactly what else Diaz can do in this situation.
“I was mad but they don’t care,” Tate said. “They know that they have a strong arm in a lot of this and it doesn’t really matter. Or if they do care, it’s not enough. Like, ‘I’m sorry but this is what you have to do for business.’ You can’t really argue with them. They’re the ones who are gonna make the final decision, so what can you do? What can Nate do? For me it was a whirlwind of emotions, just trying to decide what I even wanted to do next because I felt like it was so unfair. Then it was just coming to terms with, ‘Well, life’s not fair. What do you want to do about it? Are you ready to retire now or not?’ And the truth was I wasn’t ready to retire at that time. Obviously I still went on to fight Jessica Eye after that and went on to win the title against Holly later, so I wasn’t ready to retire but it was just the frustration.”
UFC 230 takes place on Saturday, November 3 from Madison Square Garden in New York, New York with no main event announced at this time. Fightful is providing live coverage of the event, with a post-show podcast to follow.
