Nick Diaz Turns Down Carlos Condit Rematch At UFC 171

Former Strikeforce welterweight champion Nick Diaz turned down the chance to come out of retirement with a rematch against Carlos Condit.

The two last met in the Octagon at UFC 143 in February 2012, with Condit winning the interim title match by unanimous decision.

Dana White was in contact with the Diaz camp through Saturday morning, but Diaz ultimately turned down the match in a personal conversation with White Saturday evening, the UFC president told Ariel Helwani on the UFC on Fox 9 post-fight show.

The match was expected to serve as the co-main event at UFC 171. The card was reshuffled Friday in light of Georges St-Pierre’s announcement that he was taking a leave of absence and would vacate the welterweight title. Instead of Jon Jones facing Glover Teixeira in a light heavyweight championship bout in the headliner, Johny Hendricks will face Robbie Lawler for the 170-pound title in the main event. Jones and Teixeira have been moved to the main event of UFC 172.

Dana White offered Nick Diaz a middleweight match against Lyoto Machida in August, but changed his mind a few days later.

“That was a bad idea,” he said. “The Diaz-Machida thing I was—I’m going to throw Joe SIlva [UFC matchmaker] under the bus again. That was Joe Silva’s idea. It was a bad idea.”

White said Diaz didn’t turn the fight down, but that there were “other things” going on with him. Diaz retired after losing to GSP by unanimous decision at UFC 158 and said there was no one left for him to fight in the welterweight division. Diaz wanted a rematch against the Canadian, but White was more focused on setting up a match between St-Pierre and Hendricks. St-Pierre defended his title against Hendricks by split decision at UFC 167.

In November, White said Diaz wasn’t coming out of retirement, even after he offered him a match against an undisclosed opponent.