There are a lot of very high expectations from Bo Nickal. Many expect the undefeated middleweight to be a future champion and Nickal is in the conversation for the best wrestler in the promotion. He is, after all, a former three-time NCAA D1 wrestling champion. But you wouldn’t be able to tell that from his last performance.

After all, he defeated unranked veteran Paul Craig via a decision at UFC 309. But the bizarre thing about that bout was that Nickal didn’t even attempt to take down the Scotsman even once during the entire fight. Instead, the Penn State alum was just happy to have a glorified amateur kickboxing match with Craig, which invited boos from the fans and disappointment from Dana White. But what exactly made Nckal fight this way against Craig? Well, BKFC superstar ‘Platinum’ Mike Perry has an idea.

“He [Bo Nickal] was listening to his team. American Top Team in South Florida told him, ‘Do not take Paul Craig down at any point. Do not be in his guard, do not take him down, do not be in top position. His submissions are something we want to completely take out of the chances of this fight.’ That’s all. He listened to his team. His coaches don’t care about what the fans want, they only want the best path for their fighter to get the easiest win and that’s fair.”, ‘Platinum’ said on his podcast.

Of course, Paul Craig is a pretty good grappler with six of his nine UFC victories coming by way of submission. While Nickal is a pretty good wrestler, his ground fighting ability might not be on par with the Scotsman, despite having four submission wins in his seven-fight career so far. But that makes perfect sense against Craig.

After all, ‘Bearjew’, from his back no less dangerous, having submitted Dagestani phenom Magomed Ankalaev – his only loss – at their Fight Night clash six years ago. This means that even if Nickal took the top position, as he obviously would have tried to, he would have risked falling into a submission. Instead, his team made the most logical decision and seemingly asked the collegiate wrestler to not even take that risk. Pretty reasonable from a sporting point of view, but one can see why the fans found it cowardly and boo-worthy.

The biggest problem with Bo Nickal and his UFC 309 performance

Bo Nickal thinks that his performance against Craig was ‘picture perfect’. But the fans and more importantly, verbose UFC analyst Chael Sonnen totally disagree. “You do not look at your opponent’s game to decide your strategy…  A four-time world champion refuses to use one bit of wrestling against a guy that’s never had a wrestling match. That is because of somebody in his trusted inner circle,” a heated Sonnen said on his YouTube channel.

‘The American Gangster’ advised Nickal to take a lesson from Khabib Nurmagomedov, who relied entirely on his biggest strength – his unbelievably good wrestling and ground game – to win fights. To be fair, the biggest problem with the Nickal-Craig matchup wasn’t even that Nickal chose not to wrestle. No, that could have been forgiven by fans, who always enjoy a good old striking match. The biggest problem was just how lackluster the striking was, both ways.

If Nickal had shown better skills on the feet, or maybe even knocked Craig out, everyone would have been raving about how multi-dimensional Nickal is or how he didn’t even need to use his strongest suit to win the fight. Instead, the fight was a snooze-fest, which led to Nickal’s stock going down massively with the fans and Dana White.

After all, the fans and the promotion appreciate a fighter who goes out there and gives their all, win or lose. And if Nickal wants to gain back some of the respect he has lost, it would be wise for him to focus on giving fans an exciting fight rather than just protect his unbeaten streak. What do you think about Mike Perry’s take on Nickal’s UFC 309 performance? Let us know in the comments down below.