Despite their brilliant efforts, and seemingly the support of a lot of fans, Nate Diaz and Dustin Poirier have so far, failed to bring about a 165 pound weight class in the UFC. But, now that Conor McGregor’s pushing for new weight divisions, including one at 165, could that all change?
If you’ve been following Diaz and Poirier lately, then you know that they turned heads throughout the game not long ago, by announcing their November 3rd bout at UFC 230 would be for the inaugural 165 title. The ‘news’ was embraced by seemingly a large amount of fans, and when Dana White announced there was no truth to it, you could almost hear a collective sight from the MMA masses.
Recently more than a few fighters have been pushing for more weight classes, and in particular one at 165. So far, there’s been no real sign from the UFC that they’re considering adding more weight classes. Well, recently McGregor argued that there’s room for “many more” weight divisions, and since then, he told Karyn Bryant the following (quotes via MMA Fighting):
“The game is full of bums,” McGregor said. “Ain’t s**t changed, really, so it’s good to be back. I’ve got that trilogy with Diaz. I will give that man a rematch. He gave me a rematch, so I’ll give him a rematch. [At] 155 [pounds], I’d imagine, but we’ll see because maybe we could spearhead a 165-pound division. I do believe we should go 145, 155, 165, 175, 185, even 195. Why not? There’s more belts.”
“They’re stripping people left and right,” McGregor added. “They stripped me and I only walked out the damn cage. They didn’t even offer me a fight and I was getting stripped. And then Cormier was injured or something happened to him and I got stripped of my second belt because of that reason just so they can juice up cards with belts. Well hey, stick in more weight divisions, more champions. Why not? If that’s what you’re doing anyway because you just want the belt – look what happened at UFC 230. I think the Diaz-Poirier fight should be main event, personally. It’s great for the women, get them up there but I mean, if it’s the belt that they’re doing this for then why not add more divisions, more belts, more champions, more pay-per-views with belts on the line. It’s gonna help the athletes, I believe, with weight-cutting and things like that. So maybe me and Diaz can do the trilogy at 165.”
There you have it. The biggest name in MMA says he’s interested in making the 165 division happen, so don’t be surprised if the UFC does a 180 here in the coming months, and makes that weight class. Would the UFC really pass on say, McGregor vs. Poirier or Diaz for the inaugural 165 belt? Or dos Anjos vs. McGregor? If he insisted that’s the only fight that interests him? And fans want to see it happen?
McGregor is preparing to face lightweight champ Khabib Nurmagomedov at UFC 229, Saturday night.