Gordon Ryan has now responded to the million-dollar challenge that Nicky Rodriguez laid out for him and although he has accepted it, he’s also laid out several conditions for their third match. Rodriguez issued the challenge publicly after winning the over 80kg division of the inaugural Craig Jones Invitational and it has taken several days for Ryan to respond. Rodriguez only laid out two stipulations in his challenge to Ryan; firstly that they would each bet one million dollars, and secondly that the match would broadcast on the B-Team Jiu-Jitsu YouTube channel. Although Ryan has said he’s happy with the first part of the challenge, he’s laid out terms that might potentially contradict the second.
Not only has Ryan reserved the right to choose what platform the potential third match between them gets broadcast on, but he’s also demanded the right to dictate the ruleset and the clothing that the competitors will wear. The conditions on ruleset were pretty expected, as Ryan has historically shown a preference for submission-only matches without a time limit in place. The conditions on equipment might have come as a surprise to some, but Gordon Ryan has previously accused Nicky Rodriguez of greasing after their second match together. On top of the different restrictions that Ryan wants to put in place, he also included a challenge to Rodriguez’s teammate Craig Jones as well.
We’ve transcribed Ryan’s message to Rodriguez and Jones below:
“I will say this once and only once. To nicky fraud and can’t win a (competition) Craig (Jones)- since you both have my (eggplant emoji) in your mouth 24/7, I have a few proposals for you. We either do 2 matches on 1 night, both of you either put up 500k or 1 million each, and I’ll put up 1-2 million, depending. We both compete in the same night, and winners take all. If one of you is too (cat emoji) to accept, I’ll face one of you for 1m vs 1m, which I think is comical seeing as the fact that NF is gonna have to pay roughly 350k I taxes. I know pea brain has never made 7 figures in his life, but after taxes, you have around 650k left, maybe 700 if you’re lucky. After putting at least 20% down on your million dollar house, I would absolutely be willing to bet you don’t have 300-350k cash on hand laying around to put into escrow, which means you’ll have to secure a sponsor to front you that money, and seeing as I’ve beaten you both a total of 5x, including 4 Submissions, good luck on that. Matches will not be left up to judges, will have minimal interference, and thus will be no time limit, submission only. Athletes will also be required to wear long sleeve rashguards and spats (with a no roll up rule) since 4 people have already accused you of grease (Mason Fowler, Felipe Pena, me, Yuri Simoes). Competition will take place when I’m healthy, if I’m healthy and on a date and platform I decide. Until then, keep dreaming you’ll ever be anywhere near my level after beating guys who can’t make it out of the 1st day at ADCC. If you don’t respond here or publicly, I take this as a no, and I will not respond after this unless I get a clear yes or no to this response. I’m not negotiating. I am the king, you follow my rules, or you shut up. And before you bet your newfound “wealth”, make sure you’re not gonna default on an IRS payment and end up in jail or homeless, because only one of us has a million to blow, and we all know who that is ;). This is mostly a message to NF, because) we all know Craig’s the ultimate can crusher who wants absolutely nothing to do with any kind of physical confrontation with me. Well at least Craig will be at the academy helping you prepare for the camp just like he did for (Craig Jones Invitational) and ADCC… oh wait…”
Gordon Ryan announced his response to the challenge from Nicky Rodriguez and laid out his additional conditions in a recent post to his official Instagram account:
