In an interview with Pro MMA Radio:
– “That does sound a little bit cold-blooded (on Jon Jones comments during the media conference call). Jon’s a young guy and when you’re a young guy sometimes you talk a little too fast for your brain to keep up …I don’t think it’s acceptable at all. I don’t think it’s something I’d say.”
– “It sounds like he wants to fight, huh? Those sound like fighting words. I don’t know how to judge the kid. It’s kind of messed up, to be honest. I can’t control what anyone else says and it sounds to me like he’s a little bit insecure about the whole thing. Sometimes when you open your mouth you show what you’re afraid of more than anything. I don’t know why he has such an adverse response like that to me. I’ve never challenged him or made him feel like he should do that sort of thing. It sounds to me — if I was out of the situation — that he was feeling insecure about me. … (It made Jon) sound like a baby”.
– Rashad Evans says that he’s been working a lot with Trevor Wittman. Trevor is his guy and he’s spent his last 2 camps training with him. By the way Rashad is talking, it seems like he doesn’t have a problem fighting his training partners; that he agrees with Trevor. It sounds like Rashad had enough respect for Greg Jackson’s agreement to not fight his training partners that he went along with Jackson’s law. Now that the school has grown and Jones has said he would fight Evans and Jackson has not intervened and restated his mandate that Jones never fight any training partners, things may be different.
– Rashad says that the reality may be that he won’t use Greg at all and has been playing around with the idea.
Check out Jon Jones conference call quote after the jump.
“I want to be clear to other reporters, that I absolutely HATE when people mention Rashad Evans, especially throughout this training camp. He’s a friend of mine but I’m fighting Mauricio “Shogun,” one of the best fighters that’s been around for a long time. So for people to even be mentioning Rashad Evans right now, I think, is ludicrous. Rashad is not in my mind, he’s not in my being, he has absolutely zero to do with my heart and who I am right now. Right now it’s me vs. Jon Jones and right now I’m beating all the weakness out of myself, I’m beating all the give-up out of myself, I’m beating the lack of cardio, I’m beating the lack of confidence; any sign of weakness that’s within my heart right now, I’m getting rid of it. The fact that people are bringing up Rashad, it almost angers me. Rashad has nothing to do with “Shogun” and I think from here on out I won’t even answer a question about Rashad.”