The UFC’s debut Saudi Arabia card took an enormous hit late final week when Khamzat Chimaev withdrew from his major occasion battle towards Robert Whittaker as a result of a thriller sickness. After a behind-the-scenes scramble, Ikram Aliskerov was chosen as Whittaker’s new opponent. However in one other universe the place cell service throughout America is best, Bo Nickal may need ended up getting the battle.
In a brand new interview on his YouTube channel, Nickal confirmed that the UFC had referred to as him concerning the headline emptiness. Alas, he was on one among his deep nation walkabouts and ended up being a couple of days sluggish on getting again to them.
“I did get a name, yeah,” Nickal stated. “Sadly I bought a name whereas I used to be within the mountains of Montana and I didn’t get again to cell service for 3 days. I got here again into cell service to a couple textual content messages saying, ‘Name me again, name me again, name me again!’ And … it was too late. I used to be like … okay.”
Nickal didn’t sound notably excited concerning the alternative, saying “Truthfully, I don’t actually wanna go to Saudi Arabia and battle, that’s freaking far as crap.”
However the UFC was prepared to make it price his whereas.
“I’m not gonna disclose numbers, however they had been up there,” he stated with a smile. “But it surely was simply too late. I couldn’t even actually contemplate it as a result of that they had already form of figured the whole lot out, the best way they had been going to do it as a result of I used to be gone.”
As for Khamzat Chimaev, who has gone forwards and backwards a number of occasions with Nickal by social media and the press?
“The dude’s dropping his aura a bit,” Bo stated. “I don’t suppose he’s over-training. I believe he’s over partying. I don’t know. What else wouldn’t it be? I’ve simply heard rumors about him and Until and stuff, like loopy stuff.”
Bo Nickal’s final battle was a second spherical end of Cody Brundage at UFC 300, and we nonetheless don’t have affirmation on when he’ll battle once more. However there are studies that the UFC is eyeing UFC 309 at Madison Sq. Backyard for the three-time NCAA Division I nationwide champion.
On one hand, New York is quite a bit nearer than Saudi Arabia, and now he gained’t must face “The Reaper.” On the opposite, New York taxes are killer and there’s no Saudi wage bump for saving a card final minute. As we’ve realized with different late replacements, what’s good for the pockets isn’t at all times what’s good for the profession. It’s most likely for the most effective Bo missed that decision and all of the monetary temptation that got here with it.
