The education of Nate Diaz

Nate Diaz

For starters, a Nate Diaz story. It might even be my favorite Diaz story, and it might also have some relevance to his win over Conor McGregor at UFC 196 on Saturday night.

It was the fall of 2006, and Diaz had just been offered his first title shot. This was in the WEC, the old WEC, right before the UFC’s parent company bought it and began to reshape it before ultimately shutting it down. They wanted him to fight Hermes Franca, the lightweight champ, who at the time had a little more than 20 pro fights, including UFC wins over guys such as Caol Uno and Jamie Varner.

Diaz was 5-1. He’d been a pro for about two years. He was 21, a high school dropout, a guy who didn’t so much choose his career path as stumble into it.

He’d started going to jiu-jitsu classes because his big brother, Nick Diaz, did it, and also because the older guys would buy them food from the taco truck after practice. If he went to jiu-jitsu, he got dinner. If he didn’t, maybe not.

Former WEC lightweight champion Hermes Franca

Then one day Cesar Gracie says he got Diaz a fight, which was nothing Diaz had asked for, but nothing he was going to say no to, either. Then he got him another and another. In this way, he became a fighter. Then they wanted him to fight for Franca’s belt, only at the last minute there were a few tweaks to the rules. Maybe it wouldn’t be five rounds after all. Maybe it wouldn’t take place exactly at 155 pounds.

Nate’s big brother, as he so often does, smelled a conspiracy. He told the promoters fine, they’d still do the fight, but Nate needed more money. Not the two grand to show and three grand to win they’d promised. He needed to make what Nick was currently making. He needed $12,000 guaranteed.

“I was just like, are you kidding me?” Diaz told me back in 2010. “I couldn’t believe it. I thought, man, I’m going to be a thousandaire. I’m going to buy a house!”

That stat that UFC commentator Mike Goldberg mentioned during Saturday night’s pay-per-view broadcast, how Diaz had only been finished twice in his career? This was the first one. Franca had too much skill and too much experience. Diaz was still so green. He fought hard, but succumbed to a second-round armbar.

Still, it was the beginning of something. Diaz’s next three fights came in the form of exhibitions on Season 5 of “The Ultimate Fighter.” Then he beat Manny Gamburyan in the “TUF” tournament final and won the whole show.

That was Diaz’s (19-10 MMA, 14-8 UFC) first official UFC fight, in June 2007. His win over McGregor (19-3 MMA, 7-1 UFC)? That was his 22nd. For his trouble, he received the biggest disclosed payout of his career – a little more than 40 times what he made to fight Franca.

Point is, when you hear Diaz on the FOX Sports 1 post-fight show, talking about the dues he’s paid, it’s a little too easy to forget that he’s not just making stuff up.

“I’ve been in this UFC since I was 21 years old,” Diaz said after his second-round submission win. “I think that was my 25th fight, or 26th fight. There’s no experience like that. (McGregor), I think this might’ve been his sixth, seventh, eighth fight. But we’ll see where he’s at in 26 fights from now.”

Without question, it’s the biggest win of Diaz’s career. He choked out Jim Miller on FOX. He beat Donald Cerrone on the same card that saw Brock Lesnar enter the cage for the last time. But none of his fights has brought him so much money or so much hype. He’s spent a long time trying to get somewhere in this sport, and he left a lot of his own blood on the floor in the process. In the end, it was a highly bleep-able network TV rant following his win over Michael Johnson that helped set up his breakthrough moment.

He also got an assist from UFC lightweight champion Rafael dos Anjos, who injured his foot at just the wrong time, and from UFC executives, who offered McGregor to Diaz ahead of several other qualified candidates. After that, all that was left was for him to say yes, ask for more money, then show up and fight.

Not so unlike his first big fight in the WEC, honestly. Except this time he wasn’t the kid in over his head. This time he was ready, even if he wasn’t really ready, and before you knew it McGregor was standing there flatfooted at the end of the straight left, another victim sucked into a Diaz fight without knowing how it had happened.

As for Diaz, he’d have us believe he’s not surprised. As if he knew he’d end up where he was on Saturday night, covered in blood and at least a half-million dollars richer. There’s something about that that’s hard to believe, but then, who knows?

When you’ve been at it this long, and taken this many beatings in the service of your own education, maybe you can’t help but learn a thing or two.

For more on UFC 196, check out the UFC Events section of the site.