Jon Jones has been bulking up for a few years now in preparation for his eventual heavyweight debut, but Chris Weidman has now warned him that one of the potential candidates to be his first fight in the division, former champion Stipe Miocic, has also been working behind the scenes to put on muscle mass.
“I see Jon Jones really working to gain size and Stipe was smaller,” Weidman told The Schmo. “I’ve trained with Stipe, he’s one of my boys, I was hanging out with him last night. Bro, he got big and he’s been doing it quietly. He’s like a solid 250 right now. Solid, 250, and whenever he decides to come back, he’s a problem.
“I don’t think Jon Jones wants that fight. If he thinks he’s gonna be going against a 225-pound Stipe, he’s wrong. He’s got a big strong boy that won’t stop coming forward and believes in himself and very well-rounded. He’s a different beast right now, I’m telling you.”
Miocic has always been a fairly lean heavyweight, though he’s not typically down a 225lbs as Weidman suggests here.
Instead, going by his last three fights, Miocic was 242lbs for his first title fight with Daniel Cormier, then 230lbs for their rematch, and most recently tipped the scales at 234lbs for his title loss against Francis Ngannou.
So, going up to 250lbs would certainly be a significant size increase and it’d be interesting to see what kind of impact that would have in his next Octagon outing, although it’s still a guessing game at this stage as to whether he’ll end up being the one to welcome Jones to the heavyweight division or not.
