Nate Diaz and His Title Fight Against Benson Henderson

Published 06/08/2021, 1:27 PM EDT

UFC superstar Nate Diaz is back in action after more than 18 months away from the Octagon. The Stockton native is returning to fight Leon Edwards on the main card of UFC 263 in a welterweight match-up. UFC 263 is being headlined by a middleweight title fight between Israel Adesanya and Marvin Vettori.

Diaz vs. Edwards was originally booked for the co-main event at UFC 262, which was headlined by a lightweight title fight between Michael Chandler and Charles Oliveira. However, Diaz suffered an injury that ruled him out of the fight, and UFC decided to shift it to UFC 263. Ahead of this fight, let’s take a look at the time Diaz fought Benson Henderson for the lightweight title.

The fight took place in 2012. Diaz was on a fantastic run after winning three fights in a row. In addition to that, he also won three successive bonuses in these three fights, winning submission of the night twice and fight of the night against Donald ‘Cowboy’ Cerrone.

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On the other hand, Henderson was on a five-fight winning streak that included two impressive wins over the former lightweight champion Frankie Edgar to capture and defend the belt.

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Nate Diaz gets dominated by Benson Henderson for five rounds

The fight had a lot of hype surrounding it, and fans were really excited about it. However, it wasn’t an equal contest by any means of the word. Benson Henderson utilized his superior wrestling skills to neutralize Nate Diaz’s offense. Except for the first round, he controlled the fight from start to finish.

Anyone who watched the fight saw Diaz get dominated round after round. However, the stats were even more damning for the American fighter. Henderson had 17 minutes of control in the 25-minute fight. He had landed 124 significant strikes compared to Diaz’s paltry 30. He executed 8 out of 12 takedowns while defending everything from Diaz, and amazingly, he also had a knockdown in the third round.

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Eight years ago today, Benson Henderson defeated Nate Diaz via unanimous decision to defend his UFC lightweight title #UFC
pic.twitter.com/ge7YQYhM9j
— Jon Realejo (@BloodyCanvasJon) December 8, 2020

The judges scored the fight accordingly. Two judges gave the fight 50-45 to Henderson, while the last one included two 10-8 rounds for Henderson, giving him the fight at 50-43. Diaz never got close to the lightweight championship again, while Henderson lost his title to Anthony Pettis.

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Do you think Nate Diaz is overrated?

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Written by:

Aniket Awasthi is a UFC author at EssentiallySports. This STEM undergraduate combines an insatiable urge to write with his admiration for MMA and the UFC in general to enhance his journalism. He calls charismatic names like Chael Sonnen and 'The Count' Michael Bisping as his favorite fighters, but he is a great admirer of the rise of Israel Adesanya ever since he fought Rob Wilkinson at UFC 221.

Nate Diaz and His Title Fight Against Benson Henderson

Nate Diaz gets dominated by Benson Henderson for five rounds

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