Bo Nickal will be receiving his first main event spotlight after his return was pushed back.

It was originally announced at the start of this month that Nickal would be facing Joe Pyfer at UFC 335 in December.

The middleweight matchup caught a lot of fans by surprise and created a lot of discussion surrounding the promotion’s decision to go in this direction.

December 12 was only the official date for a short time though, with Nickal revealing last week that it has been delayed until 2027.

How high is Bo Nickal’s ceiling in MMA? 🤔

Bo Nickal confirms that lingering injuries led to Joe Pyfer matchup being pushed back to 2027

Bo Nickal will compete in his first UFC main event when he takes on Joe Pyfer next February in Cleveland, Ohio.

While the matchup isn’t one that fans would have predicted, it made a lot of sense to put these two men on the final numbered event of the year.

Pyfer has said since this update was revealed that it was his scheduled opponent who needed some time to recover from injuries, which led to this change.

When speaking on the fight during an appearance on The Ariel Helwani Show, Nickal confirmed that this is the case.

“Yeah, pretty much. Bumps and bruises are a part of our job so that was something that I’ve been dealing with for a long time,” he said.

Nickal wouldn’t disclose exactly what the injuries are as he doesn’t want to make them public.

He did go on to say that this is more of a precaution than anything else to ensure that they don’t become bigger problems for him further down the line.

“We all have injuries, every fighter has injuries,” Nickal continued. “This is something I’ve been dealing with since January, February and now I feel like I’m at a point where I needed to just take some time to stop something from getting even worse than what it already is.”

Bo Nickal was also surprised by the UFC booking him against Joe Pyfer

Joe Pyfer stopped Israel Adesanya in March to secure the biggest win of his career to date.

While Bo Nickal did produce an impressive finish at UFC Freedom 250, fans would have been expecting to see Pyfer face someone higher in the rankings for his next outing.

Nickal admitted during the interview that while he was fully on board with the matchup, it did come as a surprise to him also.

He went on to say that there’s one thing he likes about this specific clash, with him not being able to recall ever being beaten by a “fellow ginger”.