Jones might pass on UFC title fight against close friend
With a victory over unbeaten prospect Ryan Bader, Jon Jones will put himself on the short list of candidates to fight for the Ultimate Fighting Championship light heavyweight title.
But there is a real possibility that Jones would turn down the opportunity.
Jones was in Anaheim, Calif., over the weekend to watch UFC 121 and make some public appearances. He also signed the contract to meet Bader at UFC 126 on Feb. 5 in Las Vegas.
Jones’ teammate and friend Rashad Evans will fight champion Mauricio "Shogun" Rua for the belt, though the date has not been set as Rua recovers from knee surgery.
Should Evans win the belt, Jones said he would pass on the chance to fight his training partner.
"Fighting Rashad is the last thing I’d ever want to do," Jones said. "To me, being able to call Rashad when we’re 40 years old and say, ‘Let’s go fishing,’ or something like that, that’s more important than the paycheck we would get today. I train with the guy. We’ve had conversations about personal things."
Jones said he promised Greg Jackson when he joined his camp in Albuquerque, N.M., not to use the skills he learned there against the other members of the team. Jones indicated the pledge extended to other members of the camp as well but said specifically he would not fight Evans.
"Not that it has anything to do with race, but we’re both African-American guys and we’re fighters. We’ve got a lot of similarities between family and all this other type of stuff," Jones said. "Rashad’s a unique character to me. There’s not many guys that I can relate to like Rashad, and preparing to do physical damage to him just doesn’t add up to me."
■ SHIELDS EARNS SHOT — Jake Shields’ split-decision victory over Las Vegan Martin Kampmann in his UFC debut on Saturday night did little to win over fans but was apparently enough to earn Shields a shot at the welterweight title.
Shields, a former Strikeforce middleweight champion, was signed as a free agent this summer. He decided to compete at his more natural class — welterweight — and was essentially promised a title shot with a win over Kampmann.
Some might question that decision after Shields struggled at times against Kampmann, but UFC president Dana White is not among the detractors.
"I think no less of him today than I did yesterday," White said after the event Saturday night. "I know who he fought. He fought a real guy, and he overcame it."
Shields laid much of the blame on his difficulty making weight. It had been two years since he had cut down to 170 pounds, and he said it affected his performance.
"I don’t want to make excuses, but that was my first time cutting to 170 in a while," Shields said. "I do think I dropped too much weight. If that was a factor, I don’t know, but I pulled out 20 pounds in a day."
He insisted he will make adjustments to avoid such a significant last-minute cut in his next fight, which will almost assuredly be against Georges St. Pierre or Josh Koscheck, who fight for St. Pierre’s belt in December.
■ KID FIGHTS — One Kick’s Gym will host an amateur Muay Thai card Saturday night to benefit Nevada Youth Outreach.
All competitors on the card will be between the ages of 6 and 18.
Golden Kicks, which starts at 5 p.m., will take place at the Sport Center of Las Vegas, 121 E. Sunset Road. For more information, contact One Kick’s Gym at 384-6786.
Contact reporter Adam Hill at ahill@reviewjournal.com or 702-224-5509.
