Evans has the Key to Beating Jon Jones–and he’s Passing it on to Vitor Belfort

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ashad Evans can boast that he was the first—and so far, only—fighter during Jon Jones’ amazing title run to go the distance. So he’s got that going for him. But during those 25 long minutes, was he able to solve to Jones puzzle? He thinks so. And he’s using that knowledge to help another fighter, Vitor Belfort, pull off what would be considered the upset of the year.

Evans appeared on MMA Uncensored Live and told the crew that yes, he most certainly has figured out weaknesses in Jones’ game. “I picked up a lot,” he said of his 5 rounds with Jones. “I was in there for five rounds. I saw a lot, and I felt a lot. I have a pretty good idea of some the things he’s strong at and some of the things he’s weak at.”

It seems Evans was more disappointed with his durability during that fight than his overall performance. “I hit him with a few good shots and I had a few good opportunities, in the fight, but I just wasn’t able to stay at the level for the whole fight,” he said of the fight. “I let myself down, in that area — being conditioned to fight that kind of fight and to keep the kind of pace I needed to stay at. I think that Vitor — we train him enough to be able to fight where I wasn’t able to.”

I like Rashad, but I really think he had more problems in that fight than just his durability. And I have my concerns with Belfort’s attempt at dethroning Jones too. He has plenty of knockouts to his credit, but Jones is a different story. Bones has already manhandled some pretty good strikers—Machida, Rampage, Rua, and even Evans to name a few. For the most part, Jones has walked out of the cage completely unscathed.

Will Belfort be any different? Despite what Evans thinks, I think Jones is too good to lose to a gameplan right now. I think the only way he can lose to Belfort—or anyone—is by lightning striking.

Continued...

My 2 cents on how to beat jones,

Machida showed us jones can get rocked and when getting rocked i notice jones seems to scramble around until he can get his composer back and part of the problem with the machida fight is that machida allowed him to recover. Vitor needs to go in hard and really strong from the starting gate and nail him with bunches of punches and drop him early. if Vitor doesnt get this done by the end of the first round then i think jones will take him out pretty easily at that point.

Wont lie, i havent seen a lot of holes in jones game yet and even the one i named is a bit of a long shot.

Agree his only chance is to attack hard and early. Vitor has never been known for his stellar cardio so it's not like he can get pissed at himself if he only loses from being gassed in the 3rd round.
I would look for Jones to start out with one of his stupid monkey crawls or some shit and then just bite down on my mouth gaurd and charge in with bombs.

I don't think Rashad should be given praise for going the distance.... at all.
I thought Machida did a better job against Jones and he ended up asleep against the cage.

agree with geks view and also i believe machida was the most successful opponent against jones so far!

i do think the key is going to be playing the same game as jones does but with more aggression.....be unorthodox in the striking department and like said above come quick...dont give any chance for jones to get timing or distance figured out......maybe even take down and gnp a bit.....

i believe that as soon as some one rattles jones or knocks him out his whole mystique is gone....i think hes so successful because he hasnt been down yet......take a look at gsp pre and post matt serra.....i believe jones has no fear...fear can be your friend or enemy.

One thing I've noticed by myself is that the main thing Jone's is susceptible too is punches.

A thing I've noticed from a whole bunch of Judo Chop's is that despite all the crazy stuff Jone's throws he has bad footwork and is pretty flat footed.

So maybe if you got a good puncher who could take advantage of Jone's bad footwork maybe he'd have a chance.

K .... so that whole Rashad as trainer didn't work out too welll.

Yeah, and Vitor did pretty much the exact opposite that all of us were saying he should do. Vitor may be one of the best pure punchers in the history of the sport, yet he just wanted to pull gaurd the entire time.

Now, if the rumors are true that Vitor was fighting with a broken hand, that may have something to do with it.

I think Vitor kept pulling guard because he was broken...Not his hand