Coach: No more short notice fights for Jones
Izzy Martinez: “Short notice fights aren’t good for Jon. Even though he’s the best fighter in the world, still that’s not what we are programmed to do.”
Then UFC light heavyweight Jon Jones was scheduled to fight Dan Henderson in the main event of UFC 151 on September 1, 2012. On August 12, UFC president Dana White announced that Hendo got hurt, and Chael Sonnen gamely stepped up.
However, Jones refused to take the last minute fight. The entire card was scrapped, and an irate White referred to Jones as having “killed” the card.
When Daniel Cormier was injured and withdrew from the fight with Jones at UFC 197, Ovince Saint Preux gamely stepped up. This time Jones accepted the fight. He explained the genesis of the match up during an appearance on The MMA Hour.
“Originally, the UFC called me and asked about Anthony Johnson,” said Jones, as transcribed by MMA Fighting. “They said that he had already accepted the fight, and they asked me if I was going to accept the fight. I told them I needed a meeting with my coaches. I had a meeting with my coaches, and the next morning I called the UFC said let’s do this thing. They said that Anthony’s camp changed their mind, I guess, since he had some dental work he needed to do. That made no sense to me whatsoever, for him to be ready at one point and then the next minute it was dental work.
“So I just told Lorenzo, whoever you need me to fight, I want to make things right for UFC 151. I want to do something for my fans, something positive. I know people who have been saving up months to make it out to Vegas for this fight. I know guys who, this is their anniversary gift or birthday gift from people, and I was like, you know what, I’ve put my fans through so much already. I need to get out there and just put it on the line. So I said I’ll fight anybody. They came up with Ovince.”
However, the fight was far from Jones’ greatest to date. At the post-fight press conference, the fighter cited the late change of opponent as the cause for the poor showing, rather than 15 months of ring rust.
“I think it was more the switch of opponent,” he said, as transcribed by MMA Mania. “If you’ve been following my career, you know how big I’m into studying. I’m huge into studying. Me and my team, that’s what we do. It’s why I’m so confident going into my fights because I know what I’m getting into. Tonight, Ovince just threw a completely different thing than what I had prepared for. I’m going to say it was more the switch of opponents than ring rust.”
Jones’s wrestling coach Izzy Martinez appeared recently on Brian Stann’s SiriusXM Rush radio show Toe-2-Toe, and said he does not think Jones will take a late replacement fight again.
“He’s a programmed fighter so it’s kind of crazy with Jon,” said the coach, as transcribed by Jed Meshew for MMA Fighting. “We were okay with him taking the fight but I don’t think Jon Jones will ever take a short notice fight again because there are too many variables that we didn’t prepare for. When you’re so focused on one person, and then you get a different person, you know it’s tough.”
“We’re not making excuses. I don’t ever make excuses. It is what it is. OSP’s a stud. He gave us a great fight. But I’ll tell you what Jonny’s got to make some adjustments. Short notice fights aren’t good for Jon. Even though he’s the best fighter in the world, still that’s not what we are programmed to do. We’re programmed to literally have a great team around us, dissect this guy, and really break it down so when we’re out there we’ve been through every possible scenario, every possible reach advantage or submission hold or grappling takedown. We’ve gone through all of those protocols. And it was unfortunate because we only had three weeks to do that.”
“We were anticipating an orthodox fighter with Daniel Cormier. Then all of a sudden with three weeks left we’re going for a southpaw fighter. Then when we get to the fight, OSP’s fighting us in orthodox! So I think that played a little bit of a factor with Jon because Jon was so focused on preparing for orthodox Cormier to a southpaw, then all of a sudden [Saint Preux] is coming out orthodox.”
“It was a great warmup fight. I’ll tell you what, DC’s in trouble now.”
Jones and Cormier fight in the main event of UFC 200.
