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The NFL and NBA would've fined or suspended Nate Diaz | read this item

The NFL and NBA would’ve fined or suspended Nate Diaz

April 21, 2010 � UFC Betting Staff � Jump to comments

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The UFC strives to make mixed martial arts one of the biggest sports in the world. Keep reaching folks. Until the promotion shows some consistency in how it disciplines its fighters it’ll be looking up at the NFL, NBA and MLB for the forseeable future when it comes to fanbase size and media coverage. Dana White has had three potentially huge headaches over the last two months. Anderson Silva’s performance at UFC 112, Frank Mir saying he wanted Brock Lesnar to die in the Octagon and UFC fighter Nate Diaz taking part in a pier six brawl on national television during the Strikeforce CBS show this weekend.

They’re all pretty serious mistakes that had the MMA world in a lather. The penalties doled out by Dana White seem to lack consistency. White threatened to cut Silva if he screws around in his next fight. Mir was on the edge of losing his fighting gig with the UFC and was fired/relieved of his WEC announcing duties. What is White going to do with Diaz? Sounds like nothing publicly according to Yahoo! Sports’ Kevin Iole:

White said he had spoken to Nathan Diaz about Diaz’s role in the incident. He
wouldn’t reveal what was said, but said he would not punish Nathan Diaz in any
way.

If Diaz were an NFL player and was caught on tape in a 7-on-1 brawl is there any chance Roger Goodell would turn a blind eye? Hell, the NFL fined Jets coach Rex Ryan for flipping the bird at the crowd at the last Strikeforce show!

The NBA’s Gilbert Arenas was basically fined $8 million for his ridiculous gun play incident in the Wizard’s locker room last year. Now what Diaz did wasn’t as serious as pointing a gun at a teammate, but he gets nothing? The public never got to see Latrell Sprewell beat the snot out of his coach P.J. Carlesimo and he still got a 68 game penalty ($23.7 million contract voided) from David Stern. Kevin Garnett just got suspended for an elbow to Quentin Richardson’s grill. What would the penalty be if he threw several punches and kicked Q while he was on the ground?

White admitted that he was protecting the fragile image of MMA when he made Mir apologize publicly and said he was embarrassed by Silva, Diaz’s rampage isn’t something to worry about?

Since the UFC isn’t going to step up, you’d expect the Tennessee Athletic Commission to impose some serious penalties. Any legitimate commission would hand out 3-4 month suspensions at minimum to Miller, Shields, Melendez and the Diaz Brothers. Keep in mind, when the Mayweather and Judah camps fought in the ring during their 2006 fight, Roger Mayweather and Yoel Judah were slammed by Nevada. Mayweather, who had a resume filled with issues, was fined $200,000 and suspended for a year.

If Nate Diaz is part of a possible suspension list then every state in the U.S. and the UFC should honor a Tennessee suspension. Not fighting for 3-4 months isn’t a career killer but at least it sends a message that White won’t.

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