Ahead of his enormous return fight against Luque at UFC Abu Dhabi, there’s some concerning news coming out of the Nick Diaz team.
The original gangster; a bonified superstar; one of only a handful of genuinely iconic fighters from the early 2010s left making waves in the UFC – the return of the one and only Nick Diaz is only a few weeks away.
Nick Diaz set to make UFC return in Abu Dhabi vs Luque
Legendary UFC fighter Nick Diaz is set to make his return to the promotion on August 3 when he takes on fan-favorite Vicente ‘The Silent Assassin’ Luque in the co-main event of UFC Abu Dhabi.
Despite an impressive bounce-back win against Rafael dos Anjos in 2023, Luque looked downright dreadful against Joaquin Buckley earlier this year, suffering a vicious TKO loss in the second as fans pondered when the Brazilian would hang up the gloves for good.
Diaz sadly hasn’t fared much better in recent times, having lost three fights in a row (in addition to a No Contest vs Anderson Silva) and without a win in the UFC since 2011 – unfortunately, the latest update on the Abu Dhabi return fight is one of nerves and uncertainty.
Coach Gracie admits Nick’s UFC return fight doesn’t make much sense
Despite having been a long-time coach of Nick Diaz, legendary Cesar Gracie revealed via Submission Radio that he hasn’t had much involvement with training camp for the upcoming fight against Vicente Luque.
Concerningly, the veteran coach also admitted that the fight itself “doesn’t make much sense” considering not only the late stage of Nick Diaz’s career, but the location of the bout itself – Abu Dhabi.
“I’m going to be perfectly honest with you, that wasn’t my idea. If I was advising Nick, I wouldn’t have advised him to do that fight. It’s [also] in Abu Dhabi, I wouldn’t advise to go fight overseas at this point.
“Luque is a very tough guy, Nick is a tough guy, but it just doesn’t make that much sense for me where Nick is at in his career; I don’t know, it’s not the fight I would have made, and I don’t even know what’s going on with that fight to be honest with you.”
Gracie didn’t go as far as to say that the fight with Luque won’t happen, but when asked what the chances are that we see Diaz actually make his ringwalk on August 3, the iconic coach simply stated, “I don’t know.”
“I haven’t been part of his training for this one, we [me and Nick] talk every day, and I don’t know what’s going to happen with that to be honest with you, it’s a tossup what’s going to happen…
“The camp, our camp in general we haven’t been as involved like we are with other stuff. I know he’s lost a lot of weight and everything, but I don’t really see him training with fighters.”
There’s no bad blood, ongoing feud or anything of the sort between the two, with Gracie repeatedly stating that he’s in conversation with Diaz on an almost daily basis – so why is there such a disconnect now compared to the Nick Diaz we all remember?
“Nick in general after the Anderson Silva thing, there was a lot of changes. I think what happened was when the commission took him out for years for the weed ban thing, whatever they were doing, I think that kind of threw him for a loop.
“He wasn’t in the gym because there was no reason for being in the gym so suddenly, he wasn’t hanging out with people from the gym, and you know it’s tough to be a guy like Nick Diaz. He’s such an icon of the sport, he’s so famous and everybody wants a piece of him.”
Gracie continued, stating that under normal circumstances, Diaz would be busy training with the likes of Jake Shields and brother Nate Diaz – but even sibling sparring sessions have become a rarity these days.
“Normally right now he’d be training with Jake Shields, he’d be training with his brother, he would have been sparring [Nate] – Nick was not there last night for example for Nate’s fight,” referencing Nate’s recent decision win in boxing over Jorge Masvidal.
“No bad blood or anything whatsoever, it’s just I think that the people that are holding on to Nick right now in Texas want to hold on to Nick.
“I hope they take good care of him,” Gracie acknowledged, adding “That’s all I could say you know.”
Nick Diaz vs Vicente Luque goes down live from the Etihad Arena in Abu Dhabi on August 3.