Dustin Poirier‘s phone has been buzzing a lot lately.
The former UFC interim lightweight champion isn’t being hit up for nothing, it looks like he has a fight coming up soon. According to Poirier, the UFC brass currently have him in talks for a grudge match with no other than Nate Diaz.
Teasing His Next Fight
Before announcing the match-up, Poirier would tease the news on ‘THE FIGHT with Teddy Atlas‘.
“Another thing that got that flame going… a couple of days ago, I got a phone call.” Poirier said. “I can’t talk about it yet. It’s a very short notice thing. Something I would hate to do is stack things against myself and take a fight on short-notice. But, we’ll see what happens. I don’t want to give too much because I don’t know what I can say.
“No contract has been signed yet. But if this does go through, I’ll take it.”
Poirier Confirms It’s Nate Diaz
Teddy Atlas would guess it was a fourth fight with Conor McGregor to which Poirier quickly dismissed. Ken Rideout, Teddy’s co-host, would then throw his dart at the board. He predicted it to be Nate Diaz, which Poirier would confirm to be true.
“I don’t owe these guys nothing, I’m not biting my tongue. It is Nate Diaz.” Poirier revealed. “Just like he got on Twitter, I’m not gonna say what card, I’m not gonna say a date or whatever.
“Everybody’s a tough guy on the internet. This guy really fights and I’m a fan of him, but everybody’s a tough guy on the internet. He said something like ‘let’s do it’, I said okay. I said I’ll fight you this month.”
What was once a match-up at lightweights look to be held at welterweight. Poirier also noted that the proposed fight should be happening in less than 6 weeks from now, if everything falls into place. That means it could happen at UFC 271 (Feb. 12).
Poirier and Diaz have been eyeing a fight with each other for quite some time now. They recently engaged in some Twitter exchanges last month. The war of words didn’t begin after Poirier’s loss at UFC 269. It just reignited.
Past History
Diaz was supposed to get a crack at ‘The Diamond’ way back in 2018. The two were originally booked for UFC 230 at Madison Square Garden. Diaz wasn’t really interested in fighting Poirier after Khabib Nurmagomedov vs. Conor McGregor was announced around that time.
However, the lightweight match-up would end up falling apart because of Poirier. The former interim champion suffered an injury and had to have a surgery.
Diaz would show no sympathy to Poirier who was hospitalized back then. He would take a dig at him, saying he ‘can’t even make it to war.’ The Louisiana-native wouldn’t let Diaz get away with this.
“F*ck you Nate.” Poirier said on a hospital bed in 2018. “You pulled out of my fight too, you a b*tch. Fake-ass gangster.”
With match-up still up in the air for 2022, it looks like Poirier will be signing the contract with a yes. Now, we will have to wait to see if Diaz keeps up with his end of the bargain.
