In August, Jon Jones, arguably the greatest fighter in mixed martial arts history, vacated the light heavyweight title, in order to move up to heavyweight. In the co-main event of UFC 253 on Saturday night, Jan Blachowicz stopped Dominick Reyes, and at the post-fight press conference the 37-year-old Polish fighter called out Jones,
Right now we can talk about him because I didn’t want to talk about him before the fight because my opponent was Dominick, said Blachowicz. Now I don’t have an opponent, so Jon Jones why not? Nobody knows what he’s doing right now, so we’ll see. But yeah, why not? He promised me this fight in Albuquerque after I knocked out Corey Anderson.
As the reason Blachowicz fought Reyes for the 205 title is because Jones left the division, the odds of the callout working are not great, so “Prince of Cieszyn” has a back-up plan.
Maybe Thiago Santos if he wins his fight against Teixeira – that would be really good, Blachowicz said. It’s been a long journey for me but I’m finally on top, Blachowicz said. It’s an amazing feeling. There are no words on how to describe how I’m feeling right now. My mind is in a different place right now, somewhere in space, I don’t know.
However, even the back-up plan has an unstable history. Thiago Santos was scheduled to face Glover Teixeira at UFC on ESPN+ 35 on September 12, 2020. But Glover Teixeira tested positive for COVID-19 a week prior to the fight, so it was rescheduled UFC on ESPN 16 to October 3. Then Santos tested positive for COVID-19, and on September 15 the fight was rescheduled again, to UFC on ESPN+ 40 on November 7 in TBA. Still, it does appear that the winner of that fight gets the next title shot, sometime early in 2021. At that point 2020 will be over, mercifully.
h/t Danny Segura for MMA Junkie
