Jon Jones shuts down potential Stipe Miocic fight in deleted tweets
Safe to say Jon Jones is not on board with UFC president Dana White’s idea of a potential matchup with Stipe Miocic for his heavyweight debut.
With negotiations having seemingly hit an impasse for Jones (26-1 MMA, 20-1 UFC) to challenge champion Francis Ngannou in his divisional debut, White mentioned the possibility of a clash with former titleholder Miocic (20-4 MMA, 14-4 UFC) during his Monday media rounds ahead of Saturday’s UFC 262 event in Houston.
His comments apparently got back to Jones, who took to Twitter to outright say it’s not going to happen, and subsequently explain why.
Related
Jon Jones 'really disgusted' by leaked Diego Sanchez-Joshua Fabia training footage
Ali Abdelaziz 'flattered' by push to manage Jon Jones: 'Jon knows my number'
Jones quickly deleted the posts from his feed, but MMA Junkie captured the screenshots of “Bones” detailing why he only want Ngannou, and does not have interest in Miocic (via Twitter):
Don’t get excited people, I’m not fighting Stipe
I’m not here to fight Stipe but I will defend my belt against him no problem. I’m looking for the biggest draw and I’m willing to wait. 33 years old in better athlete right now than I’ve ever been before.. im just going to keep training my ass off
I’m sick of hearing the same shit, you’re not a big enough star, you don’t bring in enough paper view. I’m ready to fight fights that will bring in the pay-per-view. The world wants to see some black on black crime right now and I’m ready to give it to them
Prior to the latest heavyweight title bout between Ngannou and Miocic at UFC 260 in March, White repeatedly said Jones would be fighting the winner for the belt, which ended up being “The Predator” after a violent second-round knockout.
Once the event ended, though, Jones clashed with the UFC brass over pay. The former longtime light heavyweight champion has said he wants a larger guaranteed purse to share the octagon with Ngannou, and talks have seemingly fizzed after White claimed Jones wanted $30 million, which the fighter adamantly denied.
The promotion has seemingly already put plans in motion to move on from Jones. White said this week that he’s working on Ngannou to rematch Derrick Lewis for his first heavyweight title defense this summer, and at that point mentioned the possibility of Jones vs. Miocic.
List
'Decision fighter' vs. 'one-trick pony': Jon Jones, Francis Ngannou trade barbs on Twitter
