Has Diaz Awoken a Beast Within GSP?

Nick Diaz has become the talk of the MMA world after UFC 137. Not only for his incredible performance inside the octagon, where in a fight of the year candidate he decimated the legendary BJ Penn in a fashion that no one ever had before; but for his incendiary comments towards UFC welterweight champion Georges St. Pierre in both his immediate post-fight interview and the following post-event press conference.

His octagon performance spoke for itself. He went toe-to-toe with one of only two men two hold titles in two different weight classes and completely dominated the fight from the second round onwards. Diaz battered Penn with everything in his arsenal and the normally unflappable Hawaiian had no answer for it. Penn left the cage not only without a victory, not only with his face looking the worst it ever has after a fight, but ultimately questioning whether his career should continue. That would have been a newsworthy enough end to the night.

But Diaz was just getting warmed up. Even before the decision was announced, Diaz could be heard screaming “where you at, Georges”? As soon as Joe Rogan put a microphone in front of him, Diaz launched into a tirade directed at the champion, saying he “didn’t think Georges was hurt, [but] scared to fight everybody right now”.

After the post-fight adrenaline had worn off, Diaz showed up to the post-event press conference and appeared to be more complimentary towards GSP, calling him “a great fighter an a nice guy, a great role model”. But then Dana White made the announcement that Diaz and GSP would face off Super Bowl weekend for the welterweight title and Diaz’s Stockton mean-mugging instincts kicked right back in. He renewed his insistence that GSP was ducking fights and insisted he had to “play the bad guy” in order to get a title shot.

Diaz’s antics seem to have awoken the ire of the normally soft-spoken and affable St. Pierre. As soon as Diaz’s post-fight diatribe was complete GSP reportedly went to White immediately and demanded the fight. After White made the GSP-Diaz announcement, he added “Georges St. Pierre flipped out tonight after Nick Diaz was in the ring. You’re going to think I’m full of shit but this is the truth. He said and I quote ‘Nick Diaz is the most disrespectful human being I’ve ever met and I’m going to put the worst beating on him you’ve ever seen in the UFC’”.

Joe Ferraro added in his column on sportsnet.ca that in all his years of knowing GSP, a relationship that goes back to the fighter’s days fighting for Quebec’s TKO promotion, that he had never seen St. Pierre so incensed. Ferraro went on to say that St. Pierre’s anger exceeded the time he had previously seen GSP at his “scariest”, which was before his rematch with BJ Penn at UFC 94.

Many will remember that fight as being the last time a GSP fight ended in a stoppage. Therein lies the rub. If Penn made GSP angry enough that it made GSP elbow “The Prodigy’s” face until Penn’s corner refused to send him out for another round….what will GSP do to Diaz if he’s twice as angry?

An angry, hungry, motivated GSP could be just the thing to answer his detractors as well. The biggest knock on the champion right now is his lack of finishes and recent string of decision victories. Some of those decisions have been entertaining (such as the win over Thiago Alves and his one-sided thrashing of Josh Koscheck) while others have been described by fans and media alike as lacklustre (the Dan Hardy and Jake Shields bouts come to mind). A clear-cut stoppage victory over Diaz would silence a lot of those criticisms.

The style match-up seems to favour the champion. Diaz is known for his boxing and jiu-jitsu prowess, while his takedown defence has been called into question. St. Pierre, however, has wrestling skills that are among the best in the sport. Conventional wisdom would think that St. Pierre would avoid a boxing match with Diaz and look to put the challenger on his back as soon as possible, where he can use his stifling top control and powerful elbows to beat Diaz into submission, much the same way he did against Penn.

Diaz wanted to play “the bad guy” and anger GSP into the title shot he had missed out on previously. He got what he wanted, come Super Bowl weekend the opportunity is his. But depending on GSP’s demeanour heading into the fight, Diaz may have woken a sleeping tiger and bitten off more than he can chew.