‘We Have To Defend Ourselves’

Jorge Masvidal is sharing more thoughts on Nate Diaz’s recent street fight in New Orleans, and he’s tired of people putting the blame on fighters for violent encounters in the real world.

Jorge Masvidal is continuing to throw his support behind Nate Diaz after Diaz was arrested over a street fight in New Orleans that saw the Stockton slapper choke a Logan Paul lookalike unconscious.

There’s been a lot of controversy surrounding the incident because the Paul impersonator (real name Rodney Peterson) approached Diaz with his hands in the air. That being said, he did it as a massive bar brawl spilled out into the streets, and he backed Nate up against a wall.

In Masvidal’s mind, it’s clear who’s in the right.

“When it’s you against somebody you have no idea if he’s got a knife in his pocket, if he’s gonna f—ing pepper spray you then kick you in the nuts,” Jorge said in an interview with TMZ Sports. “Obviously this guy’s not in the right mind if he’s attacking a pro fighter. I just don’t like it that people think because we’re pro fighters that we’re not able to defend ourselves.”

“No, we have to defend ourselves,” he declared. “It’s a cold world out there.”

Masvidal may have a skewed idea of what constitutes reasonable behavior in the streets. “Gamebred” started out his career in Kimbo Slice’s illegal Miami backyard fight videos, and has gotten into his fair share of grey area tussles outside of the cage. In March 2022 he was arrested and charged with aggravated battery after allegedly showing up at a Miami steakhouse and sucker punching Colby Covington.

According to Jorge, that whole situation was a case of ‘mutual combat,’ which is a legitimate thing in Florida. Whether it applies to what happened between “Gamebred” and “Chaos” is up to the Florida court system to decide. Until then, Masvidal is just enjoying retirement and his growing role as a fight promoter.

A week before his final UFC fight, Masvidal held a Gamebred Boxing event that featured Anthony Pettis vs. Roy Jones Jr., amongst a number of other interesting bouts with MMA angles. On May 5th, Gamebred Bareknuckle will feature a night of bareknuckle MMA headlined by Roy Nelson vs. Dillon Cleckler in Sunrise, Florida.

“I would definitely like to get a boxing match in there, I’m not ruling that out,” he said about his future plans. “But as of right now I’m just focusing on promoting. Promote, promote, promote, put on the best fights possible, get people to forget about their whole weeks during that 2-hour span of just good fights back-to-back and they get to relax and take the stress of the day off.”