#1 McGregor vs Diaz I
There’s no better fight in 2016 than the first McGregor-Diaz fight.
McGregor was riding the high of having knocked out Jose Aldo in just 13 seconds to win the UFC featherweight title the fight before. Aldo was a legend in the sport, and the man who many thought would finally expose McGregor as a hype-job.
Against Nate Diaz in the first fight, McGregor was expected to simply walk all over Diaz in an easy bout. This line of thinking came about because Diaz was only given a week to prepare for the fight.
Diaz served as a last-minute replacement for former UFC lightweight titleholder Rafael dos Anjos. When dos Anjos fell to injury less than 2 weeks out into the scheduled bout against McGregor, Diaz stepped in to replace him.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hMvoBc1OB8A
However, Diaz couldn’t make the lightweight limit in such a short time because he was so out of shape. He wasn’t even training and in fact, was in Mexico partying when he got the call to fight McGregor.
That ultimately didn’t matter though, as Diaz took McGregor’s best shots. Waited for him to tire himself out. And put the finishing touches on him with a come-from-behind rear naked choke victory.
It was as shocking as it was epic and McGregor was silenced, at least for the time being. McGregor won the rematch though, almost five months later.
