Fans have been voicing their opinions on Jon Jones’ current status as the heavyweight champion.
After winning the vacant title at UFC 285 in March of 2023 where he submitted Ciryl Gane, ‘Bones’ has defended the belt just once.
With many fans taking Tom Aspinall’s side on wanting the interim champion to be able to move on to the next stage of his career, a petition to strip Jones has received a lot of interest.
However, there are still some supporters out there who are firmly behind the consensus greatest of all time.
Dana White’s social media posts may suggest that a lot of people are frustrated but a counterpoint has now been launched to try and keep the heavyweight division as it is.
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Fans launch counter petition for Jon Jones to remain the UFC heavyweight champion
The change.org petition to strip Jon Jones of the heavyweight title, started by ‘Tony_Has_Died’, has now hit over 158,000 signatures.
Jones has previously stated that he’s already laid out his intentions to the UFC and that he was surprised that the promotion hasn’t made this public.
The petition clearly states that with the current champion “clearly” having no intentions of fighting soon, the division needs to move on.
Tom Aspinall helped to bring even more attention to the cause by sharing a link to the petition on his Instagram story.
A counter petition was launched several days ago to protest this, describing the rallying of fans to try and dethrone the heavyweight titleholder as “lame”.
Having been posted on May 28, 103 verified signatures have been collected at the time of writing with several fans writing comments beneath the post.
‘If we strip him of the belt, we don’t get the Jones vs Aspinall fight. I’d say give it until August. If there’s no announcement by August, strip the belt.’
‘The PFP number 1 greatest fighter ever will never be stripped. These guys are dumb—–.’
‘There is no evidence of Jon being offered a date/venue and saying no. Stripping him when he’s done nothing wrong makes no sense.’
Another comment was less passionate about their decision to support this cause, writing, ‘This was a mistake, I cannot unsign. This is the worst thing I’ve ever been associated with. HELP.’
Why Jon Jones might not be to blame for the heavyweight division hold up
Fans have become increasingly frustrated with Jon Jones and his somewhat unclear comments on retirement haven’t helped things.
That being said, if ‘Bones’ was telling the truth when he said that he already told the UFC what his plans were and that the promotion hasn’t made this public, the holdup might not be his fault.
Fans were critical of Dana White following Khabib Nurmagomedov’s retirement where it took some time before the promotion gave in and claimed that the lightweight title was vacant after trying to tempt ‘The Eagle’ back to the Octagon.
There is still so much speculation surrounding this saga but there is certainly a world in which Jones is not to blame for it, even if he’s clearly enjoying his time provoking the fans.