Nick Diaz wants catchweight fight with Michael Bisping

Nick Diaz, who recently celebrated the end of his suspension, but still finds himself suspended by the NAC due to the fact that he hasn’t paid his $100,000 fine yet, is making moves behind the scenes to set up his UFC return.

After his unanimous decision loss to Anderson Silva at UFC 183, which was overturned to a no-contest after Silva failed a pair of drug tests for PEDs and Diaz failed a drug test for marijuana, Diaz was suspended for 5 years. Fortunately, the MMA community was able to rally behind Diaz, resulting in the NAC reducing the suspension to 18 months.

Now, with Diaz’s 18 month suspension up, there has been much speculation as to when the eldest Diaz brother will return to the Octagon. A fight with welterweight champion Tyron Woodley was briefly discussed after Woodley defeated Robbie Lawler at UFC 201, however the welterweight champ ultimately signed to fight Stephen ‘Wonderboy’ Thompson at UFC 205.

According to UFC middleweight champion Michael Bisping, he ran into Diaz in New York recently, and Diaz tried to talk ‘The Count’ into a catchweight fight.

Bisping spoke on Sirius XM Rush to recall the situation:

“Another possible opponent that hasn’t been spoken about, and I was with him a couple of nights ago in New York. I bumped into him and we got talking. Nick Diaz. He was like ‘man we should fight, we should fight.’ I’m like ‘Yeah, I’m down to fight you no problem.’ And he says, ‘But we have to do it at 178.’ I’m like ‘What do you mean 178?’ He said ‘We do a catchweight, 178.’ I’m like ‘Well lets just do 185?’ He said ‘Nope, 178.'”

“I had a good time with Nick by the way, we had a couple of drinks and hangout. He’s a good dude.”

It is important to mention to while a Bisping vs. Diaz fight would certainly be interesting, Bisping is currently booked to fight Dan Henderson in the main event of UFC 204 in Manchester, England next month.