Zach Nichols slammed The Challenge: Battle of the Eras for its Karma Vote twist, suggesting it could show that the final is “rigged” if Jordan Wiseley loses.
The former Real World star and Battle of the Seasons winner believes viewers are getting to see one of the most dominant performances ever in a final from the multi-time winner.
As of this writing, MTV has aired the first part of the Season 40 final, with Jordan the clear frontrunner among the men, including Derek Chavez, Kyland Young, and seven-time winner Johnny Bananas.
Jordan had finished ahead of his castmates in multiple events, much of which was due to the amount of swimming involved and because he solved puzzles.
To get there, Jordan survived the entire season without facing a single elimination, while his castmate Bananas went in twice and won to keep his spot in the game.
Zach recently called Jordan’s final performance “dominant” and criticized The Challenge for including a Karma Vote in the outcome.
Zach Nichols slams Karma Vote while praising Jordan
“I don’t like the Karma thing either. I think Karma’s stupid,” Zach Nichols said, adding, “What you’re doing is just benefiting people who didn’t have to fight and claw and scrap their way there.”
The Karma Vote is a vote the finalists’ castmates participate in after they get eliminated from the show. Each eliminated competitor casts a score of one to five for the show’s remaining cast members based on how they felt about them during the season.
A one is the lowest, and five is the highest score. That vote will factor into the outcome. The finalists learned about this as a twist during the start of Season 40’s final.
Zach argued that people like Bananas, Kyland, and finalist Michele Fitzgerald won eliminations and said names as targets multiple times, so they would likely receive lower Karma scores than other finalists.
By comparison, Zach said Rachel Robinson and Tori Deal were among the castmates “completely insulated” from having to go fight at The Arena and then choose castmates as targets for potential elimination.
“I’m sure they got their fair share of low scores, but at this point, after day one of this final, if they can make a way where [Jordan] loses, then it is completely rigged,” Zach claimed.
“I think this is the most dominant finals performance we may have ever seen,” he said.
He suggested former show winner Wes Bergmann could have kept up with Jordan in the Season 40 final’s swimming parts.
Jordan is looking to add to his impressive achievements on The Challenge
Zach’s remarks on his podcast arrive after Bananas recently spoke about why there’s such a debate about whether or not he is the greatest competitor of all time on The Challenge.
During the Death, Taxes, and Bananas podcast, he indicated that fans may have “biases” against him and favor other castmates. Thus, they may pick who they like more, whether it’s him, CT Tamburello, or Jordan.
Bananas also said, “Numbers don’t lie,” as he’s won seven times on MTV’s flagship show and reached 11 finals. He also competed in The Challenge: USA 2 spin-off’s final on CBS.
His castmate Chris “CT” Tamburello has appeared in the final for MTV’s show 10 times and won it five times during his career.
Jordan is a three-time winner on MTV’s show, having won during Battle of the Exes 2, Dirty 30, and the War of the Worlds 2 seasons. In addition, he conquered The Challenge: World Championship alongside the UK’s Kaz Crossley to become one of the first-ever Challenge World Champions.
The Challenge: Battle of the Eras airs Wednesdays at 8/7c on MTV. The Challenge: All Stars Rivals premieres Wednesday, January 29 at 8/7c on MTV.
Episodes of The Challenge are now streaming on Paramount+. Try it FREE!
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