Jon Jones leaves door open (just a crack) to fighting Silva

Quote :

With the speculation of Anderson Silva's next bout at an all-time high, Light Heavyweight champion Jon Jones has appeared to have taken a different stance from his previous denial of ever fighting Silva. Similar to the time when he vowed to never fight former training partner and mentor Rashad Evans, Jones has made somewhat of a switch with his words today, something he has regrettably become known for:

"I respect [Silva] a lot. As I said several times, I do not want to be the guy who beat Anderson, and do not want to be the guy who lost to him. Anderson is a great champion, I'm a great champion. We both...I don't know. I don't know. I'm not saying that the fight will not happen. It can happen. But it's not something I'm chasing.” via BloodyElbow.com

So Jones is already singing a different tune, recovering from the brutal armbar of Vitor Belfort that has him on the shelf nursing an elbow injury. He is set to coach the next season of The Ultimate Fighter versus Chael Sonnen, and the two will meet in a highly publicized April 27th title fight. But beyond that, assuming Jones wins as the massive favorite, fans will be absolutely clamoring for the superfight. And of course Dana White will be all for it, with potentially the largest payout in MMA history available for the taking. Sure, it's all speculation at this point, and Jones closed by saying:

"I don't believe that I need to fight with Anderson to be the best in the world."

http://lowkick.blitzcorner.com/UFC/jon-jones-i-m-not-saying-silva-fight-can-t-happen-17734

"im a great champion" ? haha

^^^
That's what killed me.
Dude, you're not in Silva's league. Stop talking like you are.

I am not a fan of jones but i have to say i think he is not far at all from silvas level. To break it down Look at who jones has fought Vera,Bonnar,Rampage,Rashad,Machida,Shogun and now Belfort. most of the names I named are all former champions and some like shogun and machida were looked at as the future of the 205 divison and jones made short work out of almost all of them.

Anderson has franklin,henderson,sonnen,belfort,okami,leben,maia. Now lets be honest here Does andersons line up really look that much better than Jones?

I am no Jones fan and if the two were to fight i would be pulling for Silva but i have to admit jones line up looke more impressive to me than silvas. but thats just my POV.

Not so much to me.

I've never bought into the Shogun hype. I think he was a product of an easy diet of Pride cans, and it's almost unarguably been proven in the UFC, save for Dana seemingly gift-wrapping title opportunities for him and his KO of Machida. Really the only truly impressive names on Jones' list of victories are Evans and maybe Machida (who has looked much better IMO since getting caught by Shogun), and he didn't look ultra-impressive against those two.
Silva would make (or already has made) anyone on Jones' list look flat-out stupid.

its not only about who he has beaten. its about how long you have been at the top and how you carry yourself as a champion. Silva is a living legend of the sport, while jones is is still a talented newcomer. the pure fact of saying that you are on a legend level makes you even less of one. i picture some rapper, say lil' wayne, screaming how great he is in music, while beethoven smirking in his grave.

and, trigger, wtf? shogun is overrated? he has beaten rampage, nog, uberroid, arona, machida, would have won against hendo given more time...just to name the few. agree, that he has ridiculously bad cardio but when he in on he is fucking amazing.

the commie wrote:

its not only about who he has beaten. its about how long you have been at the top and how you carry yourself as a champion. Silva is a living legend of the sport, while jones is is still a talented newcomer. the pure fact of saying that you are on a legend level makes you even less of one. i picture some rapper, say lil' wayne, screaming how great he is in music, while beethoven smirking in his grave.

and, trigger, wtf? shogun is overrated? he has beaten rampage, nog, uberroid, arona, machida, would have won against hendo given more time...just to name the few. agree, that he has ridiculously bad cardio but when he in on he is fucking amazing.

Yeah, he's definitely overrated. Like I said, I give him his just due for KOing Machida, but other than that, he's done nothing more impressive than any other Pride fish-out-of-water. He beat Overeem before he became Ubereem and before he understood what MMA was. he beat Rampage, but Rampage was only a good fighter for about a year and a half, and Shogun didn't beat him during that time. He beat Lil Nog, but it was by no means an impressive win, not to mention Lil Nog himself is another Pride darling who feasted on Japanese cans and has done nothing of note since leaving there. And Arona? I don't really need to speak on that, do I? LOL

So after Pride, Shogun goes to the UFC and basically alternates wins and losses for 9 fights and is granted 2 (nearly 3) title shots. That is the very definition of overrated right there.

mmmmmmmmm NO! lol

jesus, im assuming you're not a pride fan. lol disagree that pride had the best fighters at the time? impossible to argue, in my opinion, but whatever. whomever he beat, they were still the one of the best the world could offer.
now, in my opinion, injuries to his knees played a big part of his slight demise, but he is still in the mix of the best. he beat machida twice, and as i said, would have outlasted hendo. both, no small feats. generally, if you are in the mean of the mix of the best, then statistically, you should be about 50/50 on the record.

Quote :

"I don't believe that I need to fight with Anderson to be the best in the world."

Huh. Well everybody else does, get with the program.

Trigger will rest in hell for his blasphemous Shogun comments!

the commie wrote:

jesus, im assuming you're not a pride fan. lol disagree that pride had the best fighters at the time? impossible to argue, in my opinion, but whatever. whomever he beat, they were still the one of the best the world could offer.
now, in my opinion, injuries to his knees played a big part of his slight demise, but he is still in the mix of the best. he beat machida twice, and as i said, would have outlasted hendo. both, no small feats. generally, if you are in the mean of the mix of the best, then statistically, you should be about 50/50 on the record.

No, I'm definitely not a Pride fan (clearly LOL), but that's not to say that my observations are innaccurate regarding the Pride transfers who have been less than impressive.
The only really compelling arguement that I have seen in defense of Shogun and the rest of the Pride standouts is that they, in and of themselves, were the best in the world while with Pride. And because of that, anything that happens to them post-Pride should come with an asterisk, simply because they thrived when Pride was supposedly such a mecca of elite talent.
However, that arguement would make much more sense if you applied it to today's UFC. Since Pride and the UFC were seperate entities in the time of Shogun's (amongst others) dominance, it was only a theoretical proclamation to make, since it couldn't be proven one way or the other. Now, however, the UFC is the one and only true MMA powerhouse that boasts nearly all of the world's best fighters. And as it turns out, the elite Pride transfers are struggling to stay at the elite level. If they were truly as dominant as everyone would have me believe, and if they truly were amongst the best of the best on a consistent basis, why then are they not doing so in the UFC? You could argue that time caught up with Big Nog, for example, but Shogun was considered the present and future of the LHW division when he was brought over, and as I said before, he has basically alternated wins and losses over his nine UFC fights.
That's mediocre, not amazing or elite.