Nate Diaz announces return to UFC, will face Leon Edwards at UFC 262

Nate Diaz is returning to the UFC, and his first opponent is another fighter who is no stranger to long layoffs

The mercurial star will face Leon Edwards at UFC 262 in a co-main event, on the same card as the lightweight title fight between Michael Chandler and Charles Oliveira, according to ESPN's Marc Raimondi. Despite not being a main event, the bout will reportedly be five rounds, the UFC's first non-title co-main event to feature extra rounds.

Diaz announced the fight, which will take place at the Toyota Center in Houston, on Twitter on Tuesday.

Diaz has not appeared in the UFC Octagon since UFC 244 in Nov. 2019, when he lost to Jorge Masvidal in the symbolic BMF fight. Before that fight, he defeated Anthony Pettis in a bout preceded by three years of inactivity.

Edwards is coming off a disappointing finish to his first fight in nearly two years. After a strong start, Edwards' inadvertent eye poke of Belal Muhammad led to a no-contest earlier this month. According to ESPN, the UFC had hoped to match Edwards against Colby Covington, but Covington reportedly would not agree to the fight for undisclosed reasons.

Despite that ending, Edwards still has an unbeaten streak going back to 2015 — when he lost to current welterweight champ Kamaru Usman — and spanning nine fights. Edwards had actually called out Diaz in February, and it appears circumstance has now brought the pair together.

Diaz wasn't exactly receptive to that call-out though, responding with one sentence: "And who the f*** is this?"

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