Issue 135

December 2015

The outrage about Nick Diaz’s five-year suspension from MMA is justified 

Gareth A Davies

MMA reporter for The Daily Telegraph, UK, and TV analyst asks if Nick Diaz’s punishment fits his crime

I sincerely hope this isn’t the last we see of Nick Diaz. Either as a figure in MMA or as a fighter. And if social media is now the reflection of general interest, that view is shared by the world. 

Diaz’s disjointed fight career makes him arguably the most fascinating fighter alive today. Whenever an issue involving him rears its head, we follow, we listen, we end up in long discussions. There’s no question he’s a game-changer, a rebel, steering his own course in a life both admired, and, as we now see, vilified. 

Slapping a five-year ban on a man who smokes weed is very harsh, but Diaz is unlikely to change, one suspects, in the eyes of the Nevada State Athletic Commission (NSAC), which clearly had it in for him from the minute his urine showed traces of what he described as a therapeutic process. It has deemed him a serial offender, who won’t change, and therefore, effectively, has a life sentence crushed onto his sporting career. 

Diaz, both up close and from afar, reminds me of a young Mike Tyson, the late Johnny Tapia, and many of the troubled souls drawn to fight sports whose honesty endears us to them in a way which urges us to examine ourselves. 

So – Diaz gets stoned. And maybe a lot. So what, you might say? But there is a menacing complexity to Diaz. His brushes with authority are now legendary. He is a troubled soul, but clearly a highly intelligent, fascinating man, at times at odds with himself, and beguilingly honest. Sometimes, he makes painful listening. At times, he’s like Shakespeare’s Fool, a character seemingly on the edge of madness, whose ramblings border the truth we often don’t want to confront. 

Diaz doesn’t want to ‘play the game.’ Not with opponents, and certainly not athletic commissions, and notably, Nevada. To him, MMA isn’t a sport, it’s an extension of real life. He fights like he speaks, with an open vulnerability, and fearlessness. It is easy to comprehend why most fans both admire and feel an empathy with the mixed martial artist. He claims he’s always been the underdog, and here was Diaz again, back against the wall, fighting the authorities.

He is Kafkaesque, without question, and this latest battle with the authorities – his third offense in Nevada – was for a positive test that showed marijuana metabolites. The previous two were also marijuana-related. He tested positive in 2007 and 2012 and each time, was suspended. Marijuana is prohibited in competition by the NSAC, which uses the World Anti-Doping Agency code. But the test is through urine analysis which does not clarify – and this is important – the exact time the substance was taken. 

Additionally significant in this case – and again highly important – is that Diaz passed two fight-night, ‘in-competition’ tests, at UFC 183 when he fought Anderson Silva in the main event. The outrage has been exacerbated by the NSAC giving Diaz a longer suspension than Silva got for his positive test for steroids. Silva received a one-year suspension in August, and can return in February 2016. Diaz, if his suspension holds, will be out until he is 37. That’s clearly not right. 

One commissioner, Pat Lundvall, a barrister, recommended a lifetime ban for Diaz. Even slapping five years is unprecedented as a suspension for marijuana, but why she sought to dismiss Diaz from fight sports forever is mysterious, and demonstrated vindictiveness towards the athlete. 

What negates the decision of the commission was its failure to address those negative ‘in-competition’ tests which was compelling evidence provided by Diaz’s attorney Lucas Middlebrook at the NSAC hearing. At best, it should have been heard out. Little wonder Middlebrook labeled the process a “kangaroo court” and will look to file a petition for judicial review of the commission’s ruling.

Even UFC president Dana White – who has been a harsh critic of Diaz at times, but also understands the Californian’s popularity and promotional value – saw the sentence as “a little rough.” 

Nick Diaz was punished for being Nick Diaz. And that surely can’t be right.  

6½ years

420 unfriendly

Diaz’s three suspensions for marijuana add up to 6½ years, which is unprecendented in MMA.