Joe Rogan says Nick Diaz ‘didn’t do that bad’ at UFC 266 but believes he needed more time to prepare

Joe Rogan was impressed with Nick Diaz’s performance at UFC 266 against Robbie Lawler despite the long layoff.

Diaz made his return to the Octagon for the first time since 2016 in a rematch against Lawler. In the lead-up to the fight, many didn’t know how Diaz would look, yet for Rogan, he said the Stockton native did better than he expected, but still lost but third-round TKO. However, the UFC commentator doesn’t think Diaz had enough time to properly prepare for his fight.

“He didn’t do that bad for a guy that was out six (years),” Rogan said on his podcast (via MMAFighting). “Robbie Lawler was pressuring him and he was putting it on him and he was definitely getting the better of the exchanges, but it’s not like Nick Diaz didn’t have his moments. He definitely did. He would just have to have way more time to prepare and he’d have to be really ready to go. Like the old Nick Diaz. Like the Nick Diaz that fought Anderson Silva, like the Nick Diaz that fought Georges St-Pierre, like the Nick Diaz that fought Paul Daley in Strikeforce. That dude was a f*cking killer.”

Although Joe Rogan thought Nick Diaz looked better than he thought, whether or not he can hang with the bets is uncertain. It’s also not known if Diaz will fight again, which is a question Rogan is wondering.

“Can he still do that at 38? Well, maybe,” Rogan concluded. “We don’t know if you have just have one fight. You need time. If you’re body hasn’t been used to this stuff and you haven’t been training as much as you were when you were in your prime – if you still want to do it again, he legitimately, physically probably can. But it’s like, (when you) run a marathon. When you start out and you run a mile and you’re dead, you’re like, ‘I can’t believe anyone can run 26 of those.’ But if you do it over and over and over again, you build up. I don’t think he had a chance to build back up after being off for that much time. I think you get back to where he was Nick Diaz at his best, you’ve got to have some time.”

Do you agree with Joe Rogan that Nick Diaz ‘didn’t do that bad’ in his UFC 266 fight against Robbie Lawler?