Covington : "I'm not going to humiliate the Diaz brothers."

Former interim UFC welterweight champion Colby Covington has spoken out about a possible bout with notable veteran Nick Diaz.

"Unfortunately, a fight with him hasn't been offered to me in about three years. The last time Hunter called me with Nick Diaz's name was when he was offered me at Madison Square Garden about three years ago, but he turned the fight down himself, he didn't want to come out against me, so I think the UFC just knows that putting us together isn't going to work out for them.

At the time he knew I was the best welterweight on earth. He came up to me one day when I was fighting, after UFC Sacramento, and he said: "Yeah, you're the future of this division" and showed me a lot of respect, so I'm not going to disparage the Diaz brothers and talk shit about them. Sure, they said some things about me, but they've had great success and I'm not going to sit down and say anything bad about them, but still, he ran away from the fight. He was afraid to fight me and those are the facts, that's the truth," Covington told Submission Radio.

As a reminder, the 40-year-old Diaz Sr. will share the octagon with Vicente Luque on August 3 at UFC on ABC 7 in Abu Dhabi, UAE.