Jorge Masvidal does not flinch at the prospects of fighting Nate Diaz in a boxing match. Masvidal has been there before, and beaten Diaz, when the pair starred at UFC 244 on Nov. 2, 2019. Since then, both 39-year-olds have spewed a healthy dose of venom at one another, highlighted last month by a brawl between the two camps during the last press conference trying to build the fight.

This Saturday at the Honda Center in Anaheim, California, Diaz and Masvidal, two past-their-prime MMA stars, will fight in a 10-round light heavyweight. There will be real boxers on the card, with former WBA middleweight titlist Danny Jacobs fights Shane Mosley Jr. in a super middleweight bout, as the co-feature on Fanmio/DAZN/UFC Fight Pass PPV (9 p.m. ET).

In his one pro boxing match, Diaz lost to Jake Paul by unanimous decision in which he was dropped twice in August 2023. The last time Diaz won a fight goes back to September 10, 2022, when he choked out Tony Ferguson in an MMA fight on UFC 279.

“I could care less about Nate’s background, but anyone with two hands, you always have to be concerned with and give them respect,” said Masvidal, who will be competing in boxing for the second time.

The last time he won a fight was by beating Diaz five years ago at UFC 244.

“I feel that Diaz is very limited from what I saw in his fight against Jake Paul,” Masvidal said. “What I do know is Nate is very hard-headed. He does not change. He just comes forward and tries to tire guys out. This is boxing, and he will be a par with me. July 6 will show that I am firmly a student of this game. I am looking to be as violent as possible. I love being sharp and clever that you can be in boxing. I will take his ass out by round four. I am excited.”

Masvidal’s first pro boxing match came in June 2005 against a fighter named Joseph Benjamin, who was 1-11-2 entering the fight.

“I always asked UFC to box, and they would not let me and I was always bummed out about that, but eventually, I got the permission,” he said. “I got permission to fight three times, and once I got that, I was going to take this seriously. I got to train with Roy Jones Jr. for 10 days and got a chance to train under Freddie Roach. It was amazing. I am committed to this. I trained from night-to-day.”

The hate comes from their one MMA match. That spilled over into what occurred last month, when someone from Diaz’s team threw a punch at Masvidal. Then, Masvidal’s trainer, Jorge Capetillo, got involved and a brawl erupted between both teams. Interestingly enough, Diaz was nowhere around the brawl.

“This is real, and it did not have to be like this, because it started out with mutual respect,” Masvidal said. “After he took his as kicking in New York, at UFC 244, when he needed a medical professional to save his life, he took to the internet and started saying some things like how I was a coward and all these excuses. He did not make sense. I whooped his ass for 15 minutes. It kept coming and I was fighting for world championships when he was out of the UFC.

“I signed up with Fanmio for boxing, it just happened to be against Nate Diaz. But he had to be over the top. His camp (allegedly) attacked my coach and I thought he was a coward. This is for Nate Diaz and his whole team, and he will pay for that. I definitely will put this in the purest way possible: I want to break his face; I want him pissing blood for a month. This will not be Hagler-Hearns, because I would not compare Nate Diaz to any one of those greats.

“This will not be a war. This will be an ass kicking, like the U.S. invading Barbados.”

Joseph Santoliquito is a Hall of Fame, award-winning sportswriter who has been working for Ring Magazine/RingTV.com since October 1997 and is the president of the Boxing Writers Association of America.
Follow @JSantoliquito