Jon Jones is focused on heavyweight for now, but his coach is sure he’d still jump at the opportunity to fight UFC middleweight champion Israel Adesanya.
Adesanya has repeatedly taken aim at Jones in interviews as well as on social media. Adesanya stated at an August 2020 media meeting that he would fight Jones at heavyweight if necessary. Jones hasn’t fought since February 2020 because he was dealing with legal matters outside of the cage, contract disputes with UFC and an elevation from 205 lbs. On the other side, Adesanya has continued to rack up middleweight title defenses.
Even with their paths diverging, Jones’ coach Brandon Gibson believes the three-time UFC champion would be excited about a fight with Adesanya sometime in the future.
“I mean, I’d love it,” Gibson told Submission Radio (transcript via Denis Shkuratov). “I’m sure they would sell a lot of pay-per-views. It would make a great fight for “Bones.” I’m sure he would love it and get Brandon Vera beaten up. So yeah, I would love to see that fight one day.”
Gibson mentioned a March 2010 fight between Jones and Vera. This was the first UFC main-event of Jones’s career. Jones defeated Vera in the first-round with a vicious ground-and-pound attack that left Vera with several fractures in his face.
Should Jones vs. Adesanya ever get booked? The larger Jones would have to use his wrestling skills to take on one of MMA’s most revered strikers. Gibson however likes Jones’ chances to beat Adesanya at the feet.
“Yeah, absolutely,” Gibson said when asked if Jones could win a standup battle with Adesanya. “Jon’s gone toe-to-toe with some of the best strikers in the game’s history. Guys like [Lyoto] Machida and [Quinton] ‘Rampage’ [Jackson] and [Mauricio] ‘Shogun’ [Rua] and Alexander Gustafsson. Jon can hang with any of these guys.
“Jon, with the power and the skill set that he’s really developed over the last two years, I think he’s going to surprise a lot of opponents, a lot of opponents’ teams, and a lot of fans when he gets in there and gets to showcase his new skill set.”
Adesanya sports a 23-1 pro record and has never lost at 185 pounds. The one blemish on his record came from when he moved up to light heavyweight to challenge then-UFC champion Jan Blachowicz for a second title at UFC 259. Adesanya is a dominant middleweight fighter.
Though Gibson favors Jones to defeat Adesanya, he also views “The Last Stylebender” as a special talent and one that he’s looked to for inspiration in his teachings.
“He’s also brilliant when it comes to this game,” Gibson said. Gibson said that his ability to assess speed, time, range, angles, and level change is unmatched. He’s already become a dominant champ at middleweight. I think he has some of the best feints in the game. He’s so good at using his feints to create the openings and in that split second, depending on the opponent’s reaction to that feint, identifying the opening and taking it. Just ultra sharp. Ultra-sharp defense. His movements aren’t too dramatic. It’s not like that Dominick Cruz style that we saw, he pretty much over-dips, over-slips.
“Israel is just pinpoint making guys miss by a millimeter. So that’s something I really admire in his style and in his game and there’s elements of it that have definitely inspired me to try to put little sprinkles of that with my own fighters.”
Watch Gibson’s full interview with Submission Radio here:
