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“Bo Nickal, I Hope You Are Listening…”: Olympic Gold Medalist Warns Former Penn State Wrestler Following Controversial UFC Debut at UFC 285

Published 03/06/2023, 5:36 AM EST

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One of the greatest events of the world’s biggest MMA promotion just passed by. The UFC community still can’t get over UFC 285. The main fight card was indeed the biggest treat for the fans. Before the greatest victories of Jon Jones, Alexa Grasso, and Mateusz Gamrot, it was Bo Nickal who set the octagon on fire. Nickal made his submission victory against Jamie Pickett look so effortless. It was indeed a clash that involved heavy strikes, followed by a lot of blood. However, Nickal dominated the entire fight and won against Pickett by an arm triangle choke in the very first round itself.

The American fighter, who has achieved four victories and zero defeats in his fighting career, proved that he came to the promotion to stay. However, when everyone praised Dana White’s contender series Alumni for winning his debut fight in the UFC octagon, the former two-divisional champion, Henry Cejudo, advised Nickal to work on himself.

Henry Cejudo is not impressed with the wrestling style of Bo Nickal

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Bo Nickal’s victory was the most expected one, as he has proven himself a great wrestler before stepping foot in the UFC. As a collegiate wrestler, Nickal was a three-time NCAA Division I National Champion and a three-time Big Ten Conference champion out of Pennsylvania State University. On the other hand, Henry Cejudo is the only man in the world who has won an Olympic gold medal and UFC titles in two divisions. Cejudo took to his YouTube channel to give his instant reaction to UFC 285 fights. The American fighter, Kelvin Gastelum, also joined him. When both fighters were talking about UFC 285 fights, Cejudo cut in to warn Nickal.

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 ‘The Messenger’ said, “There’s a huge hype going around with Bo Nickal. I did see some, obviously, he did win, but I also saw a little difference in the two. Because he did stronger to get that takedown. MMA wrestling, it is different than NCAA Wrestling. They have to continue to keep building Bo Nickal. If they don’t build Bo Nickal, when they give him somebody tough, well, Nickal is going to struggle because I saw what I had to see within those first two minutes.” 

Cejudo has advice for the newbie

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‘Triple C’ detailed that he was curious to know how the fight between Nickal and Pickett would go on. He talked about Nickal making constant efforts to submit the 34-year-old. Cejudo also noticed the different grappling styles of Nickal.

“I’m Not a Cheater” – Bo Nickal Breaks Silence on Heinous UFC 285 Allegations

He further added: I was curious to see if you didn’t get the arm triangle, how was he going to come back in that second round because there’s a lot of squeezing, there’s a lot of blood, constricted through you trying to submit somebody. But other than that, again, I had in the first-round submission, it happened but moving forward… Bo Nickal, I hope you’re listening you’re gonna have to keep taking at least about six fights like this before you start getting up to like the top 10.”

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 What do you think about Cejudo’s advice?

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Written by:

Priyanka

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Priyanka is a UFC writer at EssentiallySports. She has been an ardent fan of the UFC since 2018. She is passionate when it comes to writing about the sport and this is evident in her articles.
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Edited by:

Rohini Kottu