After this, no one can doubt Mario Lopez’s toughness. On Thursday (Sept. 16), the Saved By The Bell alum shared some “battle damage after a jiujitsu workout. In the photo Mario, 47, posted to his Instagram page, the Access Hollywood host showed off a major black eye. In fact, the eye was so red and bruised, it appeared to be swollen shut! “Gonna need a little cover-up before going on TV,” joked Mario, though, from the look of the shiner, this injury was no joke.
However, some of Mario’s followers and friends poked fun at his injury in the comments. “Bro – what did you do???? Never f-ck hi the money,” wrote actor Frank Grillo. “Bruh but like why tho? [laughing with tears emoji] let’s see the other guy,” added Mario’s Access costar Scott Evans. The official Access Hollywood account wrote, “Ouch!!!!” while actor Tommie Romola went off. “I GOT UR BACK BROTHA , I’LL MAKE A PHONE CALL I GOT GUYS IN CALIFORNIA TOO … HOPE UR OKAY [fist bump emoji] GO GET EM MARIO!”
One fan commented that they were “actually surprised you don’t get dinged more often Boxing/Wrestling all the time.” It’s true — Mario is active in combat sports. Days before he showed off his black eye, the actor best known for his role as A.C. Slater shared a picture of him alongside Frank Grillo, 56, with his hands taped up. “An Italian and a Mexican walk into a boxing gym, what do you get? Chingasos!” wrote Mario. Good to see my guy @FrankGrillo1.”
2021 has delivered some hard hits to Mario. Earlier in the year, Mario’s Saved By The Bell costar Dustin Diamond passed away from stage IV lung cancer. Mario was the first of Dustin’s former coworkers to reach out to him after news of his diagnosis broke. Following Dustin’s death, Mario told HollywoodLife that the current Saved by the Bell reboot would honor the actor who portrayed Samuel “Screech” Powers on the original series.
“I’ve always been cool with him, and it would be nice to do a little something to honor him, and I think that’s in the works,” said Mario, adding that, at the time, they were hammering out the details as to what that tribute would look like. “There have been different creative ideas floating around,” he told HollywoodLife. “I don’t want to throw a monkey wrench in any of them. As long as it’s done in a tasteful, cool way, I’m good with it.”