Since winning the UFC light-heavyweight title, Jon Jones has been candid about his intentions to move up to heavyweight at some point in his career. With his roster of potential title challengers thinning at 205-pounds, Jones believes it is simply a matter of time before he moves up in weight.
Asked about potential opponents that catch his eye, Jones responded honestly that he would prefer heavyweights that were not necessarily the “bigger ones.” This led him to mention Fabricio Werdum as an example of a heavyweight he believes he can beat with relative ease.
“There are definitely a lot of heavyweights that I know I would beat,” Jones stated at Monday’s press conference (via MMAFighting.com). “A lot of heavyweights that could give me a hell of a run or possibly beat me. I keep it real. I’m smaller than these guys. A guy like Werdum, I would fight him every day, all day. Why? Because he’s not the biggest guy. But the heavyweights I believe would give me the hardest time are the big ones. Not necessarily the better skilled ones — just the bigger ones. You shoot in and they sprawl out on you, that’s going to take a lot of energy to finish that shot, you know what I mean?”
Once Werdum was made aware of Jones’ comments, he immediately offered to face the light-heavyweight champion in a superfight – even though his main focus is on a title unification match-up against Cain Velasquez next June.
“I don’t know why didn’t he said that before I become a champion,” Werdum told Globo. “He said it now but I would fight him for sure without any problem. He has to go up or make it a catchweight bout. But my biggest goal is to fight Cain Velasquez [undisputed champion] to unify the belts. Dana White even spoke to the media it is going to happen in June. It has even a schedule and he would like this fight to happen in Mexico, so no way we will do it.”
Since Jones stated that he would “fight Werdum every day, all day,” the Brazilian invited Jones to come train at his gym where they can fight each other everyday of the week.
“He (Jones) said it just to say, I don’t know why he did it, but he also stated he would fight me every day, so he means that he wants to train with me. To fight everyday he has to train, right? The academy is over at Kings MMA, where we train hard everyday. If he wants to pay us a visit or train with us and is ashamed of saying it, that’s fine. Welcome, when he wants, we are in Huntington Beach, at Kings MMA. He can train with us everyday (laughs).”
Transcription taken from MMAMania.com.
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