Rejoice, ye fans of the 209, for Nick Diaz’s exile has come to an end. Stockton’s favorite son has accepted a one-year suspension for no-showing USADA tests, which, given Diaz’s reputation for no-showing just about everything, has to be the least surprising anti-doping violation in history. (So take that, Brock Lesnar and Alistair Overeem.)

But the key takeaway is that, with this behind him, Diaz is eligible to return to action in the UFC as early as next week.

Let me step out on a limb here and say, yeah, it’s probably not going to be that easy. Diaz (26-9 MMA, 7-6 UFC) is not the type to get off suspension and just take any old fight. He’s never been one of those whoever-the-UFC-puts-in-front-of-me guys, and he’s probably not going to start now.

UFC President Dana White has put forth the theory that Diaz will never fight again due to a general lack of “desire.” Then again, there were times when White said the same thing aboutGeorges St-Pierre, right before he came back and won the UFC middleweight title.

Still, Diaz is, in every possible sense, something of a special case. We must proceed with caution here. Who knows how many cracks we’re going to get at this. It could be zero. It could be a half dozen or so.

That’s part of the enigma of the elder Diaz brother. If he announced he was returning to make a run at the title, I wouldn’t be surprised. If he announced that he was retiring forever to open a bicycle repair shop that also sells THC-infused smoothies, I’d somehow be even less shocked. So let’s look at some of the more likely options and try to figure the odds.

Option 1: ‘Fun’ fights

Diaz returns to a different UFC than the one he left three years ago. That means, for one thing, he’ll not only have to get his Reebok on if he wants to fight in the octagon. But it also means that he’ll probably be less restrained by the limits imposed by stuff like rankings and good sense.

In fairness, Diaz was already pretty unrestrained in that area. He got a crack at St-Pierre’s welterweight title when he was coming off a loss to Carlos Condit, and then fought former middleweight champ Anderson Silva when he was coming off a loss to GSP. In some ways, he was out here doing fun, borderline senseless bouts before it was cool.

But what would it mean for a 34-year-old Diaz, who could conceivably fight at both middleweight and welterweight, to do that in 2018? Are we talking Michael Bisping retirement fight kind of fun? Because sure, I could get into that. Are we talking Robbie Lawler rematch kind of fun. Because, pardon me the use of a hashtag, that one is #WouldWatch all the way.

Matter of fact, you could do only rematches. Give him Condit again, maybe even GSP. Diego Sanchez is still here, somehow, so run that one back too. Why not, when it’s all just for fun, right?

Option 2: Treat him like any other would-be contender

We’ve seen the UFC do this with a few former stars it seems to have tired of. No special treatment or unique matchups, just plunk him down in the division and give him whoever is available on either side of him in the rankings.

I don’t have to tell you what a waste this would be, right? Plus, there’s a good chance Diaz just wouldn’t do it. Like his younger brother, you offer him a less-than compelling opponent at non-life-changing money, he’s probably not even going to call you back. Treating him like just another guy in the division is a good way to end up with no Diaz in any division.

Option 3: Use him as a stepping-stone for some young contender

OK, so I thought the second option was bad until I got to this one. This is the only truly bad idea in the bunch. It’s also one of the oldest tricks in the fight promoter playbook.

We’ve seen the UFC do this before. Remember the sad and somehow ongoing saga of B.J. Penn? Remember Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira getting trucked by Cain Velasquez? How about Dan Henderson getting mauled by Daniel Cormier?

This is consistently one of the most depressing recurring scenes in the fight game, and it’s practically a reflex for the UFC at this point. It’s not too hard to imagine Diaz vs. Colby Covington or Darren Till or Kelvin Gastelum. It’s also not hard to imagine watching that fight and then feeling like you need to go cry in the shower afterward.

If this is the plan for a Diaz return, for the love of the MMA gods, just cut him and let him go be a sideshow star in Bellator instead. Please. That, or rethink the whole Lawler idea, because I really do think it’s genius.

For more on the UFC’s upcoming schedule, check out the UFC Rumors section of the site.

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