Jake Shields, a longtime teammate of Nate Diaz was in his corner for the classic rematch with Conor McGregor at UFC 202.

Shields says that he believes Diaz won a close decision but admitted that the fight was very close and still wanted to make a better assessment after watching the replay.

“It was an amazing fight, first off. It was one of the best fights I’ve seen in a while. Secondly, I thought Diaz pulled out a close decision. I need to go home and re-watch it on TV. Initially, I thought it was close, but I thought Diaz pulled it out. But when a fight’s that close, there’s not much you can do.”

The Team Diaz fighter who has had his history with McGregor also had some praise for the featherweight champion.

“I wasn’t really surprised. I mean, McGregor’s an amazing fighter, he’s one of the best out there. We expected the war in these fights – one of them could go and finish the other guy quick, or it could be a five-round war. We don’t really know what’s gonna happen, so we’re prepared for everything.”

All in all with Shields initially thinking Diaz won, he still says that the fight was so close it was hard to really tell what the judges were going to rule immediately after the bout.

“I wasn’t very sure. I thought he won a close fight. I think a couple of those rounds were pretty close. Diaz dominated a couple of the rounds more than Conor dominated them. So I feel like from the whole fight standpoint Diaz definitely wins, but when you start adding each round up, it gets pretty tricky.”