Yesterday, B.J. Penn decided to turn to twitter and vent a little. He sent a tweet to what he thought was former opponent Nick Diaz’s twitter account, complaining about the way Diaz fought against him at UFC 137, and even took a shot at Jon Fitch in the process. Well, you can always count on Nick’s manager Cesar Gracie for a quote, and it didn’t take him long to respond to Penn’s rant (via GracieFighter.com):
“BJ Penn has apparently not come to terms with the beating he received at the hands of Nick Diaz….”
“At some point it is up to those around you to protect you from yourself. To take you aside and let you know you are wrong and help save you from your folly. Unfortunately for Penn he is surrounded by “Yes Men” that are unwilling to do that. The outcome will be predictable, resulting in a fighter that will never push himself to the fullest and will always have excuses for his losses.”
Gracie actually asked Penn if he wanted to merge camps a couple of months ago, but Penn refused, saying he had been a member of Nova Uniao for a long time and would stay that way. Cesar Gracie isn’t exactly a bastion of honesty at times, but it’s hard to argue with what he’s saying here. It’s the same thing that people have said for years about Penn. While it didn’t stop Gracie from being one of the guys that profited from it before (he has sent the Diaz brothers over to Hawaii to help BJ train for fights in the past), he has at least been up front about his feelings for Penn in the aftermath of UFC 137.
Will we ever see this rematch? Will we ever even see Penn in the cage again? Diaz certainly has bigger fish to fry at the moment with an upcoming UFC 143 fight against Carlos Condit that will decide who gets the interim UFC welterweight championship. Perhaps someday all of this might mean something again. But it won’t be anytime soon.
