When former UFC light heavyweight champion Jon Jones ran a rental into a pregnant woman’s vehicle, breaking her arm, and then ran up a hill and over fence, he destroyed a significant part of his career. He was stripped of his title, suspended by the UFC, and lost virtually all of his blue chip sponsors.
Gone were Gatorade, Reebok and EA Sports.
Jones did not speak with the media for over half a year, before opening up to Ariel Helwani earlier this week. In a discussion that last over an hour, Jones revealed that his management had reached out to Floyd Mayweather’s Team Money.
Jones said he will not so much necessarily be trying to get back in the good graces of his previous sponsors, but rather instead intends to do things better.
I honestly feel like things are going to better now than they were before because of my outlook on life and some of the things I’ve been through,” said Jones as transcribed by FightState.com. “I really believe things are going to be better than they were before so if I don’t get back to working with the companies that I was with in the past, I believe that there are better companies out there for me. I ain’t got nothing but time to prove this to be true…
Maybe Floyd realizes that I’m a controversial subject, kind of like him. A lot of people love him, a lot of people hate him, but a lot of people tune in for his fights and maybe he realizes that about me and relates to that in me. I haven’t (talked to him yet), but my business partners have already reached out to him and you may see me in some Money Team gear. I’m not saying I’m joining ‘The Money Team’, but it’s definitely a possibility, I’m not opposed to it. Floyd’s career has been tremendous.
Mayweather has previously discussed both starting up an MMA promotion, and managing MMA fighters.
However, the most intriguing thing would be Al Haymon getting involved in MMA. Haymon is restoring some of the excitement to boxing, through is Premier Boxing Championships. Haymon is an adviser to Mayweather, and a deep thinker. Al Haymon connecting with Jon Jones could be be game changer.
