Nate Diaz Says He Would’ve Beat Leon Edwards ‘In A Real Fight’

Nate Diaz walked away from his five-round fight with Leon Edwards thinking what could’ve been.

Despite being dominated for the majority of the history-making bout, Diaz found some success in round five. The UFC fan favourite badly rocked Edwards who was able to survive the last few seconds on seriously wobbly legs.

At the UFC 263 post-fight press conference, Diaz talked about feeling a sense of victory despite walking away with a lopsided decision defeat.

“I got cut in training, that’s why we had to push the fight back for a month,” Diaz told reporters, including MMA Junkie, at the UFC 263 post-fight press conference. “I kind of lost all motivation to train and work out hard and all that, so I kind of just lingered around for a month to get ready for war like that. At the end of the day, I feel like he won or whatever, but I feel like I’m the better fighter still regardless, and I feel like the peak of the fight is what matters anyway in the end.

“No hate on Leon, congratulations to him and why would you fight anybody but the top guy if you’re going to fight at all,” Diaz added. “I wish it would’ve went my way, but it’s all good.”

Diaz feels he just ran out of time and in the real world he would’ve beat Edwards.

“Fight was a wrap,” Diaz said. “In a real fight in the real world, that’s a wrap. So, yeah. He was sleep-walking.”

Diaz want to get straight back into camp for another fight in the next few months.

“I want to fight in three or four months,” Diaz said. “I’m ready to get back in there. Just to heal up. If I was unscathed I would be back in next week. I just wasn’t motivated to train anymore because I already put in the hard work for the next fight in Texas where it was supposed to be. It had to linger on for another f*cking month and it just sucked so I just rolled with the punches and did what I had to do to get here.” (Transcribed by MMA Junkie)

Do you think Nate Diaz would’ve knocked out Leon Edwards if he had more time?