Nate Diaz and Leslie Smith Sued By Management Firm

TMZ reports that Nate Diaz is being sued by management firm the Ballengee Group. They claim that they arranged the multi-million dollar deal for the UFC 202 fight with Conor McGregor only to get fired a month before it happened. Attorney Jason H. Friedman filed the lawsuit in the Dallas District Court. They claim they’ve worked with Diaz since 2014 and worked out deals for fights with Rafael Dos Anjos, Michael Johnson and the first McGregor fight, which happened at UFC 196.

Ballengee thinks things went sour in July of last year after the deal was signed for Diaz vs. McGregor 2 in August. They say the firing was unexpected and they were never paid their percentage for the fight. At the time, UFC 202 was the promotion’s biggest PPV. Ballengee is demanding over a million dollars in damages.

Meanwhile, MMA Junkie reports that Leslie Smith and attorney Sam Awad were also named in the suit. Smith was signed on both Nick and Nate Diaz’s recommendation in March 2016. Smith later fired the group in November. They claim that without their knowledge, Awad started “interfering with their agreements” with the Diaz brothers and suggseted that Nate and Smith shouldn’t pay them.

They are suing Awad for tortious interference and claim the defendants “intended to avoid payment for the plaintiff’s services by intentionally or knowingly securing the performance of the service by deception,” or “knowingly securing the performance of a service by agreeing to provide compensation and, after the service was rendered, failing to make payment after receiving notice demanding payment.” They say if the interference didn’t happen, they would still be working with Diaz and Smith. Ballengee wants “exemplary damages” along with “actual, economic, and non-economic damages in an amount within the jurisdictional limits” of the court and attorney’s fees.