New Year’s Resolution: Jon Jones Edition
By Eddie Sanchez
Closing out 2020, The Bad Promoter will publish a few New Year’s Resolutions for some of our most prominent combat sports friends. The third in this series is Jon Bones Jones, the potential MMA GOAT.
Life is a mixture of laughter, pain, ambition, trials-and-tribulations, among other emotional characteristics. For Jon Jones, his trials-and-tribulations, for the past decade plus, have largely been out of the cage. These mix ups have been covered extensively over the years, so there is no need to pick at old wounds, but the key takeaway from these is that Jon Jones’ professional career has been negatively affected by his actions outside of it.
Beyond the illegal elbows against Matt Hamill, in 2009, which gave Jon Jones his only professional loss, his title reign has only been put on hold three times because of various suspensions. At this time, Bones does not hold a belt because he is moving onto bigger and better things at heavyweight. Given this information, it seems his New Year’s Resolution is quite simple: be active, conduct himself on his best behavior, and end 2021 as the Heavyweight Champ.
Following UFC 254, Jon Jones found himself ranked 2nd on the UFC’s P4P list. Khabib announced his intentions to retire and the Light Heavyweight king was recognized as the best mixed martial artist in the world. Jon Jones did not take this lightly and has since made his intentions clear about his move to the heavyweight division.
Jon Jones intends to add another layer to his GOAT-claim. He wants to be the eighth fighter to hold a belt in multiple weight classes. Currently that list includes Randy Couture, BJ Penn, Conor McGregor, Georges St-Pierre, Daniel Cormier, Amanda Nunes and Henry Cejudo. Although Jon Jones is already viewed as a key member of MMA’s Mount Rushmore, he wants to distance himself from the pack and be viewed as the undisputed GOAT in the eyes of the MMA community.
Fortunately, the UFC is 100% on board to see these intentions through, and they are looking at hosting Stipe-Miocic (C) – Francis Ngannou II in March. The winner would then be expected to face Jon Jones.
In their first encounter, Stipe dominated Ngannou on his way to a unanimous decision victory. Ngannou is currently riding a four fight KO streak and looks like a much more dangerous fighter than in their first encounter. For selfish reasons, I am hoping that Stipe continues his reign and defeats his rival a second time to set up a Miocic-Jones Super Fight.
Stipe would be the perfect opponent for Jone Jones’ legacy. He has the longest string of title defenses in UFC Heavyweight Championship history with three defenses. Assuming he defeats Ngannou, he will be looking to match that feat once again against Jon Jones.
Alternatively, Jon Jones will enter the Heavyweight division facing the man who many consider to be 1a-1b in the MMA-Heavyweight-GOAT conversation. If he is able to take down Stipe, it will be a vast accomplishment for his professional legacy and will surely see him rise to Number 1 P4P.
Regarding The Bad Promoter’s New Year’s Resolution for Jon Jones, simply defeating Stipe would not be enough. I want to see Jon Jones conduct himself professionally inside and outside of the cage. All eyes will be on him in 2021 and having a clean year will do wonders for the types of conversations fans will have about him once he retires.
Sports fans are largely forgivable people. If Jon Jones finishes his career on his best behavior during his run in the Heavyweight division, he will have shown a tremendous growth in character.
The final ask from The Bad Promoter is that Jon Jones remains active in 2021. Now, the ask isn’t for him to fight four times, or even three times. If he wins the Heavyweight belt and defends it, that will be sufficient enough in my eyes. He could then get on a regular fighting schedule and plan out 2022 accordingly.
Now it is FAR too early to be looking ahead to a potential title defense, in regards to his potential opponent, but the ask remains true. We want Jon Jones to give the people what they want and finish his career strong.
So with respect to Franics Ngannou – let’s see Stipe Miocic handle business and offer the fans the Heavyweight Super Fight we have been craving for some time.
Will we see Jon Jones have a clean 2021 outside of the ring? Will he end the years as the Heavyweight Champ? Those questions remain to be seen, but what is known is that Jon Jones will once again use the frustrations of 2020 to prove to the fans that he is the GOAT.
