Cesar Gracie dismissed the notion that Nick Diaz has never paid taxes, and also implied that his fighter may have had a mole in his camp leading up to UFC 158.
Gracie, who trains and manages Diaz, made his comments during an interview with Ariel Helwani Monday on “The MMA Hour.” Diaz stole headlines despite losing to Georges St-Pierre Saturday by claiming that he was probably going to jail because he never paid his taxes. Gracie told Helwani that is not true, and that Diaz probably misspoke Saturday.
“I just have to invest a little more money (in training),” Diaz said after the fight. “Now that I have a little bit more money. I’ve never paid taxes in my life and I’ll probably go to jail.”
Diaz made his comments in a casual manner. Gracie says Diaz often contradicts himself and frequently thinks aloud, which results in wild comments like that. He told Helwani that Diaz probably meant to say he needs to file his taxes for the year.
“He has paid taxes. I think he misspoke; it’s about filing,” Gracie told Helwani. “I talked to Nick a couple years ago about tax issues he was having. As far as paying taxes, he would pay the tax and probably more than he needed to the last two years. He’s paid hundreds of thousands in taxes. He’s not in a James Toney situation or Wesley Snipes. I think his issue is he needs to properly file, so he needs to get together with a good accountant. But he has paid a lot of money in taxes.”
Gracie said he’s not aware of Diaz being in any legal trouble because of his taxes.
Gracie also said in the interview that he felt like GSP was one step ahead of Diaz the entire fight. Gracie found that odd and seemed to believe there may have been a mole in his camp.
“It’s almost like GSP knew the moves that Nick was going to do from bottom,” Gracie told The MMA Hour. “That’s my idea watching the fight. It was really weird because Nick does stuff that’s very unique, and he does it in grappling but he doesn’t necessarily do it in fighting. And he was doing it more in fighting, and it was just kind of like, ‘Wait a minute, this man’s like one step ahead like he knows exactly’ … it was kind of odd, almost like someone from our team or something … I don’t know. That’s whatever. I don’t want to make that an issue.”
Later in the interview, Helwani asked Gracie if he still wants to manage Diaz. He said he would have to discuss that with Diaz because the job is difficult and stressful, but he would still want to coach him.
I think the implication that Diaz had a mole in his camp just shows us how good GSP is. It’s possible that GSP may have done some exceptional film study work to learn habits of his opponent. But we’ve had the Diaz camp accuse GSP of being on steroids, using bad hand wraps, and having a mole. Just give the guy credit finally.
And as far as the tax stuff goes, I think we have clearly learned that you cannot believe things Nick Diaz says.
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