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The Final Fighter 5 winner and fan favourite Nate Diaz will battle out his contract when he takes on Khamzat Chimaev within the UFC 279 most important occasion on Sept. 10.
The undefeated Chimaev (11-0) is coming off a unanimous choice win over Gilbert Burns in his final outing. Diaz (20-13) final fought at UFC 263 in June 2021, shedding to Leon Edwards by choice. Previous to the bout agreements being signed, Diaz requested to be launched from his contract, or be given a ultimate battle so he may pursue enterprise choices outdoors of the UFC.
The battle promotion opted to line him up with the most well liked up-and-comer within the welterweight division. It’s not the match that Diaz’ coach, Cesar Gracie, wished.
“I can let you know, it wasn’t on my record. I used to be attempting to have him battle Chandler truly, as a result of Chandler wished to return up in weight. And I mentioned, man, that is an thrilling man. Look, he’s gonna go for it. Nate’s an thrilling fighter. Let’s have this battle occur,” Gracie advised Submission Radio.
“Nate wished to battle [Dustin] Poirier, as a result of they’ve had a feud, they had been speculated to battle earlier than. And so the UFC ended up placing the opposite fighter in. And I assumed, oh, the man used to battle at 185, he dropped down, he’s 170 now. And Nate is a 155-pounder who simply doesn’t need to minimize weight, just about is why he needs to battle at 170. Yeah, it was a bizarre matchup for certain. However, being 5 rounds and every thing, you realize, I believe Nate can convey him into deep water, and hopefully pull one thing out. That’ll be good.”
Chimaev is 9 years youthful than the 37-year previous Diaz. He’s closely favored within the betting traces. Gracie believes the battle promotion lined Diaz up with Chimaev to have Diaz go away with a loss.
“It’s no secret once you wanna go away the UFC, they need to ensure you’re not gonna go away as a winner. They need to just be sure you’re not gonna assist one other group out, is what I’m pondering. So, the fights that made sense with Poirier and, you realize, there’s a whole lot of different fights that made much more sense, they mentioned no to. And I do know Poirier wished that battle too. So why not give these guys that battle? It was speculated to occur earlier than, it made a whole lot of sense. Or somebody like Chandler or one thing like that,” Gracie mentioned.
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Regardless of the allegedly motives of the battle promotion reserving the battle, Gracie believes that there are areas that Diaz has the benefit.
““On the standup. He’s a younger child. Khamzat’s a younger man, he’s bought a whole lot of power. He’s very robust. He’s bought excellent wrestling to take it to the bottom. I believe what I noticed in his final battle is he was taking Gilbert Burns down, however after some time he realized it was form of harmful down there and the battle ended up being extra of a standup battle than something. I believe Nate truly has higher fingers than Burns does. And I believe one other factor is, Khamzat, he comes at you with a whole lot of ardour and he needs to complete you. He’s already mentioned that is gonna be Nate’s funeral. So, he’s placing the stress on himself to complete this battle fairly fast. And if he comes out laborious like that, you realize, I believe that’ll work into to Nate’s favor, to be trustworthy with you,” Gracie mentioned.
“I believe Nate has to convey him into deep water. Clearly you gotta be in form to do this. Nate’s at all times in form. Standing up? I give the sting to Nate. On the bottom? I believe Nate’s a greater grappler. However, you’re combating a youthful man that’s robust. It’s positively a troublesome battle, however there’s methods to win this battle.”
Gracie sees the match with Chimaev as have a whole lot of similarities to Diaz being introduced in on brief discover to face Conor McGregor at UFC 196. We all know how that ended.
“All of the stress’s is on him for this battle. The expectations on him are large. They’re already speaking about him combating for the title in opposition to [Kamaru] Usman. So, there’s a whole lot of stress on him. And if he has a foul exhibiting, it’s actually gonna harm him greater than anything. So, I believe there’s stress on him to win, win convincingly and make a press release.
“And I believe with Nate, there’s not as a lot stress on him. And Nate is Nate, and we’re just about nearly like in the same state of affairs after they introduced Nate in for the McGregor battle. In sure methods. Right here’s our celebrity, McGregor, he’s the following biggest factor, he’s gonna go proper by way of Nate. After which Nate form of confirmed him that that essentially may not occur. So, yeah, I’m pondering the stress’s on Khamzat on this one,” Gracie mentioned.
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