Teammates of Diaz, McGregor will have first say in settling feud at UFC 202

By Case Keefer (contact)

Friday, Aug. 19, 2016 | 2 a.m.

Nate Diaz and Conor McGregor weren’t the only UFC 202 fighters engaged in the battle of bottles at Wednesday’s news conference.

And they also won’t be the first to settle the dispute. McGregor’s teammate Artem Lobov and Diaz’s teammate Chris Avila face each other on the undercard of Saturday’s event at the T-Mobile Arena representing Dublin’s Straight Blast Gym and Stockton, Calif.’s Cesar Gracie Jiu-Jitsu, respectively, hours before the main event.

“I already have enough motivation to destroy this kid,” Lobov said, “but this is the cherry on top. I’m looking to leave him mangled.”

Diaz proposed the featherweight bout during UFC 202 negotiations as a way to get his latest protégé, the 22-year-old Avila, into the world’s top mixed martial arts organization. It was a fortunate turn of events for the 30-year-old Lobov, who figured the UFC would cut him after two lopsided unanimous-decision losses in his first two official bouts in the octagon.

The matchup immediately had added significance for Lobov since Diaz had routinely insulted Straight Blast Gym since defeating McGregor after UFC 196 in March. His teammates stood united with the criticism, and a rivalry emerged.

“We definitely don’t like them,” Avila said.

That was apparent Wednesday with the eruption of the latest confrontation between the two camps. Avila and Lobov were both among the feuding entourages at the David Copperfield Theater inside the MGM Grand, and made no apologies for how everything played out.

Even though Diaz was the one to bolt from the news conference and hurl the first bottle, Avila blamed McGregor arriving 30 minutes late for sparking the situation.

“Conor tried to come in like he was the show, he came in with his team like they were the guys,” Avila said. “Now we’ve got real people with us, so we weren’t going to play no funny games out there. So Nate decided, ‘Let’s get out of here. Don’t let Conor come in and try to steal the show like he’s some King or something.’”

Lobov has always enjoyed watching Nate and older brother Nick Diaz fight but was turned off by their antics. He said Wednesday’s incident was another example.

“We came in as professionals to sit down and watch the press conference,” he said. “We had no intentions for anything else to happen.”

The Diaz camp posted a video on social media with a child accusing McGregor of hitting her with a bottle in the crossfire, but Lobov said it was fabricated. Lobov reported his crew had the most undeserving person on the receiving end of a flying object.

“There was one issue we had with Dee, Conor’s girlfriend getting hit with something so that wasn’t nice,” Lobov said. “This is the kind of people they are, throwing stuff at women.”

Avila fired a bottle himself, but downplayed the danger of the dust-up at Thursday’s UFC 202 media day.

“It was just water bottles, wasn’t nothing to be scared of,” he mumbled while staring at he floor.

If there wasn’t a sign with his name next to him Thursday, anyone could have been convinced that Avila was the third Diaz brother. Beyond his reminiscent mannerisms, Avila wore the same attire — a black tank-top beater and jeans — as Diaz did on Wednesday. Avila also described a similar strict vegetarian diet.

It’s hard to believe they only met a few years ago, when Avila stumbled into the Diaz brothers’ gym wanting to get into MMA. Their connection was instant.

“(Nate) teaches me everything,” Avila said. “He’s always telling me where I’m wrong, and he’ll correct me.”

The relationship between Lobov and McGregor is more of a friendship. Lobov started training only a couple years after McGregor, and being at the same weight, they sparred together on a near daily basis.

He thought it was a fluke when McGregor lost to Diaz earlier this year, and wanted to do his part in getting vengeance. The desire only intensified after what happened on Wednesday.

“Now it’s certainly personal,” Lobov said. “They’ll pay for that.”

Case Keefer can be reached at 702-948-2790 or [email protected]. Follow Case on Twitter at twitter.com/casekeefer.