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The longtime Cesar Gracie disciple made his debut as an 18-year-old on Aug. 31, 2001, rose quickly through the regional ranks and established a cut following with his in-your-face approach, volume striking and venomous submission game. Diaz has captured several championships along the way, tested himself against all-time greats and competed on some of the sport’s brightest stages. His record currently sits at 26-10 after his technical knockout loss to Robbie Lawler at UFC 266 on Sept. 25. Only Diaz and perhaps those closest to him know whether or not he will fight again.
As the MMA world awaits word on Diaz’s next move, a look at some of the numbers that have accompanied him to this point:
38: Years of age for Diaz, who was born in Stockton, California, on Aug. 2, 1983.
13: Diaz victories by knockout or technical knockout, accounting for 50% of his career total (26). His list of Ultimate Fighting Championship victims: Lawler, Gleison Tibau, Koji Oishi and Drew Fickett. Diaz owns eight other victories by submission and five more by decision.
11: Consecutive wins for Diaz between May 11, 2008 and Oct. 29, 2011. It figures to go down as the longest such streak of his career.
5: Welterweight champions in World Extreme Cagefighting history, Diaz among them. Shonie Carter, Karo Parisyan, Mike Pyle and Carlos Condit were the others.
178: Significant strikes landed by Diaz in his unanimous decision over B.J. Penn in the UFC 137 main event in October 2011. It remains one of three UFC appearances in which he has connected on at least 100 significant strikes but the only such fight from which he emerged victorious. He landed 105 of them in a unanimous decision defeat to Condit at UFC 143 and 150 of them in his aforementioned technical knockout loss to Lawler.
84: Seconds needed for Diaz to put away Oishi at UFC 53 on June 4, 2005. Having occurred more than 16 years ago, it still ranks as the fastest finish of his 38-fight career.
495: Days spent by Diaz as undisputed Strikeforce welterweight champion. He laid claim to the promotion’s 170-pound title with a first-round technical knockout of Marius Zaromskis on Jan. 30, 2010, successfully defended it on two occasions and then vacated it on June 9, 2011.
3: Diaz wins over former UFC champions. In addition to his aforementioned conquests of Penn and Lawler, he cut down Frank Shamrock with second-round punches under the Strikeforce banner on April 11, 2009.
.725: Cumulative winning percentage between the 10 men—Lawler, Condit, Parisyan, Georges St. Pierre, K.J. Noons, Sean Sherk, Joe Riggs, Diego Sanchez, Kuniyoshi Hironaka and Jeremy Jackson—who have defeated Diaz. They boast a combined record of 271-101-2.
9: Promotions in which Diaz has registered at least one victory. He has gone 7-7 in the UFC, 6-0 in Strikeforce, 3-1 in EliteXC, 3-0 in the International Fighting Championship, 2-1 in Ultimate Athlete, 2-0 in Dream, 1-0 in Warriors Quest, 1-0 in the WEC and 1-0 in the International Cage Fighting Organization.