CageCraze was live as Strikeforce held a conference call today in support of their upcoming January 29th event, Strikeforce: Diaz vs Cyborg.  In attendance for the call were Strikeforce president Scott Coker, welterweight champion Nick Diaz and middleweight champion Jacare Souza.

As usual, Diaz was a little late to the call.  He lackadaisically answered questions about his vegan diet and his participation in triathlons and barely lifted an eyebrow when asked what he thought about his upcoming title challenger Evangelista Santos.

Thankfully, Scott Coker had left the call by the time Diaz was asked about moving up in weight to fight opponents like Mayhem Miller because he probably wouldn’t have been very happy with his response.  Diaz has had an ongoing feud with Miller but they could never agree on a weight to fight and planned grudge match between them was cancelled, replaced by a title defense.

The sleeping giant finally stirred:

“I’d be happy to move up, I’d like to get paid for it you know?  I don’t like how people try to say that I didn’t accept the fight with Miller because I was too small.  I never said anything about that.  I said if I’m going to go off track and screw with my whole season, it’s going to screw with my whole year, it’s going to screw with my capabilities of fighting at 170lbs.  If I’m going to do that I’d like to get paid in full.  I would like to have a reason for doing that.  Not just do it at everybody else’s convenience.  I’d like to get paid something extra: double, triple, something crazy for me to do something extra that would screw up my weight to fight at that weight.  I never didn’t want to sign for that fight with Miller.“

Diaz and Mayhem Miller have been verbally sparring ever since Miller was jumped by Diaz and the Cesar Gracie team live on national television during the Strikeforce: Nashville event in April after Miller had interrupted Diaz’s training partner Jake Shields in his post-fight interview.  Diaz made it clear that it was the money, not the weight that has kept the fight from happening.  He even accused Miller of being afraid to drop down in weight to fight him, his voice getting more and more animated.

“They were talking about making me move weights.  I said tell his ass to get in f***ing shape and make weight like I do.  It’s f***ing hard enough for me to make 170lbs.  He acts like he wouldn’t be able to do it, he doesn’t want to work hard like me, that’s the problem.  He can work his ass off and make 170lbs or 175lbs or somebody can pay me a f***ing couple million dollars and I’ll move up to 185lbs and fight him.”

Diaz also expressed frustration at his current pay and appeared pretty angry that top stars in other promotions like Georges St. Pierre of the UFC of Manny Pacquaio in boxing make so much more than him.

Pacquaio’s making 40 f***ing million dollars, GSP’s making a couple million dollars. I’m over here f***ing driving a Honda and my shit’s breaking down?  F*** all you mother f***ers.

I had a chance to ask Diaz why he was so intent on calling out Georges St. Pierre despite the fact that he’s unavailable to him as an opponent and he responded with “Because you f***ers in the media rank him higher than me.”

Diaz’s phone was having some issues but he said that just because they are in rival promotions doesn’t mean the fight should never happen.  It’s an interesting topic to think about going forward, but the UFC has said they will never co-promote especially after all the troubles they had with Pride back in the day.  It’s just not worth it to them and I doubt it will ever take place.