NDA Athletic Recovery Coach Jose Garcia claims Cesar Gracie is attempting to sabotage Nick Diaz’s training camp for UFC Abu Dhabi.
It was in a recent interview with Submission Radio, that Nick’s former coach weighed in on Diaz’s slated return against Vicente Luque at UFC Abu Dhabi on August 3rd.
“Nick is a tough guy. But it just doesn’t make that much sense to me where Nick is at in his career,” Cesar Gracie said of the Nick Diaz vs. Vicente Luque fight. “It’s not the fight I would have made, and don’t even know what’s going on with that fight, to be honest with you… It’s a toss-up what’s gonna happen. I don’t really see him training with fighters. And I don’t know what’s going on with that fight.”
Gracie continued:
“He’s just not really part of the training with the guys right now. Like, normally right now, he’d be training with Jake Shields. He’d be training with his brother. He would have been sparring. Nick was not there last night, for example, for Nate’s fight… No bad blood or anything whatsoever. It’s just I think that the people that are holding on to Nick right now in Texas want to hold on to Nick. And so, I hope they take good care of him.”
Cesar’s comments clearly did not sit well with NDA Athletic Recovery Coach Jose Garcia / BBJ, who shared a much different opinion on the matter with BJPENN.com.
“Nick Diaz fired Cesar Gracie as trainer and manager back in 2014 or 2015. He then hired Ballengee Group before the (Anderson) Silva fight. Nick of course went into great detail explaining why he split from Cesar.”
According to Garcia, ‘The Stockton General’ attempted to rekindle their relationship and when he did, Gracie quickly pounced on the opportunity to exploit Nick.
“Nick rekindles his communication with Cesar just to be on good terms before leaving for Florida to train and isolate himself from the COVID restriction that was in California. He gets in amazing shape and then Cesar sees the opportunity to slide in and capitalize off of Nick’s last possible fight vs Robbie. Another management team had already secured the Robbie Lawlor fight contract while Nick was in Florida. But Cesar then got involved and found a way to void Nick’s contract so that he could get the contract made in his name. Cesar had nothing to do with getting this fight made, Cesar was under the impression that Nick was still retired. Once he saw that Nick was active, Cesar manipulated his way into Nick’s life so that he could benefit from voiding the current contract so that he could make his own. Cesar’s whole motive was to be on the contract and get paid for Nick’s next fight.”
Jose Garcia then claimed that Cesar Gracie forced Nick Diaz to proceed with the Robbie Lawler fight despite being in bad shape both physically and mentally.
“Nick gets out of shape in California under Cesar’s watch and instead of pulling him out of the fight, Gracie forces Nick to move forward with it. Nick walked into that fight in bad physical and mental shape. So, Cesar makes his money and promises to help Nick with his taxes but proceeds to be nonexistent to help him. Nick basically remained in the exact same IRS situation that he was in going into that fight.”
Nick Diaz and Robbie Lawler at UFC 266
According to Garcia, the exploitation tactics against Nick Diaz are still occurring to date, this with his scheduled Octagon return less than a month away.
“Fast forward to 2024 and Nick’s life is in shambles. His team helped get him out of Vegas and California, and he has once again moved, this time to Texas. Nick gets in great shape negotiates directly with Dana and Hunter by himself. He gets a fight and now Cesar is back. Due to the fact that Cesar is scared to fly and has no control over Nick’s contract with the UFC he is trying to discourage Nick from fighting in Abu Dhabi which once again is causing Nick to be mentally stressed instead of focusing on his fight. You got one side telling Nick to focus on himself and train and fight to make his own money and get himself right and you have Cesar on the other side trying to convince Nick to cancel the fight and take the fight in America where Cesar can have much more control of Nick. Preferably anywhere in California or Vegas so he can make the drive since his scared of flying. This is about controlling Nick in order to get as much money out of him because he feels he’s owed that since the game has grown and the guys make more money now. Note this, Cesar doesn’t make 1 dollar off of Nate and hasn’t made money with Nate for almost 10 years now.”
f’d up if true
Cesar low-key always seemed like a snake in the grass.
I wonder why the Diaz bros always rep’d him so hard.
This sounds like a bunch of excuses being laid out by the new trainer in the event Diaz looks like shit again, or doesn’t even make it to the fight.
You don’t have to be a fan of Cesar, but nothing he said in this particular interview was wrong or bad or meddling…he wasn’t even the one to bring up Nick, he was asked about it, and said multiple times he’s not involved in the fight at all. It doesn’t mean that there’s not more going on behind the scenes, but just using this interview to try and say he’s interfering isn’t a good look.
can’t be fucked to read that. it’s not the word count, i just find some people’s words to be unpalatable.
can anyone be arsed to write out cliffs?
Diaz and Gracie have been on the outs for about a decade now. 40 years old and hasn’t won a fight in 13 years. If it isn’t a payday what’s the point at this stage in the game?
no point really
He isn’t a real gracie
Its the other way around, Cesar is looking out for Nick because his current team is mismanaging him.
Say what you will about Cesar but he made a great point - why is Nick fighting Luque? Overseas? Bad call.
Just because it’s true he shouldn’t be fighting Luque doesn’t prove Cesar has Nick’s best interest at heart.
ok?
Wouldn’t be surprised if theyre both fighting over who gets to exploit him.
Management of fighters is shady as shit like 95% of the time.
100%
Didn’t Nick originally part ways with CG over the belief he was getting taken advantage by him?