UFC suspends Nate Diaz for 90 days, fines him $20,000 for derogatory tweet

A day after handing Nate Diaz an indefinite suspension pending an investigation, the UFC has come up with its terms for the recent lightweight title challenger.

Diaz (16-9 MMA, 11-7 UFC) has been suspended for 90 days and fined $20,000 by the UFC for violating the company’s fighter code of conduct. The UFC, in a statement released Friday, said the $20,000 fine will be donated to charity.

“The language used in his tweet was regrettable, offensive and inconsistent with the values and culture of the organization, and is not tolerated,” the statement read.

Diaz on Thursday took to his Twitter account in response to the news that Pat Healy had tested positive for marijuana and been suspended – and that the $130,000 in bonus money he got after his UFC 159 win over Jim Miller this past month would be lost.

But the crux of Diaz’s offense was when he called UFC bantamweight Bryan Caraway a derogatory term of homosexuals. With Healy losing his $65,000 “Submission of the Night” bonus from UFC 159, Caraway, the only other fighter with a submission on that card, received it instead.

“I feel bad for pat Healy that they took a innocent mans money and I think the guy who took the money is the biggest F-g in the world,” Diaz wrote on Twitter. Though the tweet remained up for a while, it since has been removed from Diaz’s timeline.

Not long after Diaz’s tweet on Thursday, UFC President Dana White told MMAjunkie.com (www.mmajunkie.com) the fighter would be fined and suspended – or possibly released from the promotion. Later Thursday night, UFC officials issued a statement that said the company had suspended Diaz pending an investigation, and then

“We are very disappointed by Nate Diaz’s comments, which are in no way reflective of our organization,” the Thursday statement read. “Nate is currently suspended pending internal investigation, and we will provide further comment once the matter has been decided.”

And that matter now will be the 90-day suspension, effective immediately, and the $20,000 fine. That should make Diaz eligible to fight again on Aug. 15, two days prior to its first event on the new FOX Sports 1 cable network.

Diaz this past month at UFC on FOX 7 was knocked out for the first time in his career when Josh Thomson upset him in San Jose, Calif. That loss came on the heels of a lightweight title fight setback to champion Benson Henderson at UFC on FOX 5 in December.

Diaz’s suspension is just the latest for a UFC fighter involving potential offensive language on social media or in the media in general. In 2011, the UFC released bantamweight Miguel Torres for tweeting a joke making light of rape, though it later reinstated the fighter after he apologized. And earlier this year, the UFC suspended and fined heavyweight Matt Mitrione for comments he made about transgender fighter Fallon Fox. White didn’t reveal the amount of the fine, and Mitrione’s suspension lasted about three weeks.

Diaz has not yet commented publicly about the suspension, fine or the tweet itself.

(Pictured: Nate Diaz)