What a complicated time it is for Bo Nickal! Walking away from wrestling, the 3-time NCAA Champion had been having a great start to his MMA career. 7 wins – everything was going fine. Until that is, the loss to Reinier de Ridder on May 4. The fans turned on him like he was always an outsider, and they were just entertaining him.

Well, being a Penn State alum, the guy is wrestling royalty, and he has lived in both combat sports. And he definitely has a preference. The comments he made – let’s just say it can get the MMA community riled up. Maybe that’s his aim. Who knows? Either way, he hasn’t left much for interpretation. So, what is Bo Nickal saying?

It all got out in the Nickals and Dimes episode on May 23. He was talking to guest Mitchell Mesenbrink, and the talk of MMA and wrestling came up. And this is how he started. “Going into MMA actually makes me appreciate wrestling, like, a lot more because of the culture and the community.” Woah, the MMA fans won’t react too kindly to that. But you know Bo Nickal. He says what he wants.

It’s just that the 2019 Dan Hodge Trophy winner has found wrestling to be more cultured. And he feels the MMA community to be superficial. “The community of MMA is not at all what the community of wrestling is … It’s very vapid and very, like, surface level.” And this was not the most scathing attack. “I would say 99% of the MMA community has very little understanding of MMA and like what it takes.”

Is it because Nickal was told he was fraud-checked by Reinier de Ridder? We can’t say for sure, but he does talk about winning and losing. “In the wrestling community, it’s like people have reverence for the sport. They have reverence for, like, what it takes. They have reverence for people that win or people that lose. Like if you’re just, like, going for it, people respect you regardless.”

He even spoke about how he connects with his wrestling heritage. And not just that, most of his close friends and people who understand him are people from wrestling. “People that are like really, like, ride or die with me, that, like, get my journey and understand that are wrestling people and like – you know my teammates and coaches and people that I’ve got to know growing up.”

His friendship with fellow Penn State alum, Anthony Cassar, is well-documented. They were roommates at Penn State, and Cassar had followed Nickal in pursuing an MMA career. And the way the 29-year-old talks about Penn State and hypes them up, years after he left the college, you know a part of him will always be there, where his coach, Cael Sanderson, is still the boss.

A fun fact – Bo Nickal learnt to play poker from now Penn State General Manager Clay Steadman. You can understand how close the bond was there. And how wrestling is like family, and much closer to his heart. But MMA, as he says, it’s mostly driven by materialistic motives – “People coming into the sport that aren’t really invested in it … they like the entertainment of it, but they don’t understand it at a deep, profound level.”

Well, Bo Nickal didn’t hold back any of the punches. Was he finished? Oh no. He had more to say. “And there’s also the fact that I would say – the majority, if not the vast vast majority of people, that are watching fights are all betting on it. Like they’re watching fights because they put $10 on a parlay, and they want to see the result, and they want to win some money. But that’s not a thing in wrestling, like there’s no betting. It’s just pure.”

Well, he may have a point. But how will the wrestling community react to this? He kind of burnt the bridges with them after the UFC Des Moines loss.

Will this get Bo Nickal in good graces with the wrestling community?

Bo Nickal is a winner, no doubt. And he has said he won’t quit. His exact words in the ‘The Ariel Helwani Show’? “I believe that one loss doesn’t define me. Even if I lose again, I could lose 2, 3, 4, 5 times… I’m not gonna quit. I’m just gonna keep getting better and keep improving… I just want to keep getting better at fighting.” But he didn’t stop there, did he?

Well, like we said before, the fans turned him like he was an overrated wannabe. And Bo Nickals wasn’t having any of it. On his YouTube Channel, he hit back at his critics. “All the negative comments, I look at that, and all I say is just like, suck my d—.” And it went on and on. “But when I get back on top and when I’m the freaking champion of the world, they’re all crawling back! And I will spit right in your face.”

Safe to say, the fans were not having it. The verdict was out. “Apparently knees to the gut and chin didn’t humble him. He’s done. Won’t get another top 15 match up. I was rooting for him. But damn. Learn some humility.” This was one fan’s retort. And the other reactions were similar. Some sarcastic, some downright disapproval of the wrestler.

The thing is – Bo Nickal has always been like this, wearing his heart on his sleeve and being crude. As for his dig at the MMA fans, let’s see what they will have to say about this.