Nick Diaz will not be fighting Jay Hieron in their originally scheduled welterweight title fight at Strikeforce’s “Carano vs. Cyborg” event on Aug. 15. Instead, former TUF 7 reject Jesse Taylor will replace Diaz to face the Xtreme Couture fighter.

So why is Diaz not fighting? Well, he smokes weed. Medicinal marijuana is legal in California and he is allowed by law to toke. Except, the California State Athletic Commission (CASC), a state government run organization, considers the herb a banned substance for pro MMA fighters. So Diaz is allowed to toke by one section of government and not allowed by another section of the same government.

Diaz was selected for a random drug screen on short notice according to a report at MMA Weekly. Apparently it takes Diaz ten days to flush the marijuana from his system and he was not given ample time to do so. If he took the drug test and failed, he would most likely not be allowed to fight for at least a year. The thinking apparently was that in the long run it was better for Diaz to not take the test.

Diaz’s manager, Cesar Gracie, commented on the situation. “He fights every two months,” said Gracie. “It’s too bad for Jay Hieron, but what can you do? If you take the test, what’s going to happen? What’s going to happen is he’s gonna not get licensed in California for over a year and not fight this fight. If you don’t take this test, you don’t fight this fight, and you fight next month, because you have time to flush it out of your system.”

Jesse Taylor will be no easy match for Heiron, After a loss to C.B. Dollaway in July 2008, and departing from the UFC, Taylor has gone undefeated in seven straight fights. He has already fought six times in 2009, finishing all but one of his opponents. His last fight was a first round TKO victory over Dong Sik Yoon at DREAM 10 in July.

“Strikeforce: Carano vs. Cyborg” will air live on Showtime from the HP Pavilion in San Jose, Calif. on Sat., Aug. 15, beginning at 10:30 p.m. ET/PT.

If you have never heard Nick Diaz expound on the benefits of marijuana, let me resurrect this little piece of historical media from the PRO MMA (promma.info) archives:

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