UFC heavyweight champion Jon Jones reacted to a petition garnering thousands of signatures asking for him to be stripped of his title.
The heavyweight title clash everyone wants between Jon Jones and interim titleholder Tom Aspinall continues to be in a holding pattern as summer quickly approaches. Despite months of negotiations between Jones, Aspinall, and the UFC brass, UFC CEO Dana White remains adamant in making the fight come to fruition.
Aspinall recently set the record for the longest-tenured UFC interim titleholder amidst his wait for the Jones fight. He made a rare interim title defense last July at UFC 304, finishing Curtis Blaydes in the first round.
Jones proceeded to finish Stipe Miocic in his long-awaited first title defense at UFC 309. Immediately after defeating Miocic, Jones turned his attention towards negotiations with the UFC brass over the Aspinall fight, which remain at a standstill.
Jon Jones compares viral petition to one of his infamous UFC controversies
Many UFC fans are becoming increasingly agitated with Jones and his ongoing hiatus from the Octagon. Calls for Jones to be stripped of the UFC heavyweight title have skyrocketed in recent weeks, especially after Jones flip-flopped on a potential retirement on social media.
The frustrations of UFC fans in Jones resulted in a viral petition, on the website Change.org, calling for Jones to be stripped of his UFC championship. The petition garnered around 20,000 signatures in a week, and as of this writing, has just over 42,000 signatures and counting.
The petition showcases how many UFC fans are fed up with Jones holding on to the UFC lineal heavyweight championship without a clear timeline for a return to defend it. If Jones either vacates or is stripped of the heavyweight belt, Aspinall will fight for the undisputed title against another top contender, likely against a name like Ciryl Gane or Jailton Almeida.
After the petition garnered attention online, it didn’t take long for Jones to take notice, as he shared a reaction in a recent Instagram comment.
“The equivalent to pico grams [LAUGHS],” Jones commented.
Jones referenced a famous controversy from earlier in his career, after testing positive for minuscule traces of a banned performance enhancing substance. The positive test forced the UFC to move an event from Las Vegas to California after the Nevada State Athletic Commission refused to allow Jones to compete.
Jones went on to win the then-vacant UFC light heavyweight championship over Alexander Gustafsson at UFC 232. He knocked out Gustafsson in Round 3 in a rematch of their instant classic first fight years before.
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Jon Jones was ‘choked out’ by social media star Hasbulla in viral meeting
As the wait continues for Jones’s decision on a return to the Octagon, he’s enjoying some vacation time in Thailand. During recent filming of a The Ultimate Fighter spinoff opposite Nate Diaz, Jones and social media star Hasbulla met for the first time, and the encounter didn’t disappoint.
Hasbulla ‘choked out’ Jones in a hilarious moment between the two stars. Hasbulla has befriended Islam Makhachev, Khabib Nurmagomedov, and other top UFC stars during his social media ascent.
Speculation over Jones’s UFC career continues to run rampant, and in the meantime, the UFC’s lineal heavyweight champion is enjoying some downtime away from the Octagon.