UFC middleweight champion Israel Adesanya was unsuccessful in his attempt to step up to light-heavyweight and seize the belt from Jan Blachowicz recently, but while he’s moving back to his own division next, he’s not given up on the idea of fighting Jon Jones at some stage in the future.
“Hell no,” Adesanya told ESPN when asked if the Jones fight was now dead in the water. “This is just a valley in my story. In any movie, in any anime series, you always have the valleys and you rise up from that. This is just mine and it’s like, all right, cool, bet. I’m taking this very well, and I know exactly what I have to do to get back to my true self, so yeah, I’m doing just that. But nah, that fight’s not dead. I’m coming for that ass.”
“This is deeper than fighting now. He knows, we know, we all know what he’s like. We all know how fake he is. It’s not even gonna take long before he f***s his life up again if he hasn’t already and kept it low key and swept it under the rug. You had quarantine Izzy last time going at him and just giving facts, straight facts, so I’m just taking my time right now, doing my own thing, focusing on myself. But, he should do the same because his life could be in shambles.”
Jones was quick to gloat in the wake of Adesanya’s defeat and insisted the middleweight champ was no longer worthy of his time, but ‘The Last Stylebender’ points out that ‘Bones’ didn’t exactly impress in his last few outings at 205lbs either.
“That shows his character,” Adesanya said. “Find a tweet of me tweeting after he wins even against Dominick Reyes. Find a tweet of me kicking him when everyone is sh*tting on him. He barely beat Thiago Santos; Dominick Reyes arguably kicked his ass. Find the tweet of me going at him and taking a victory lap. This shows the character of who he we are. It shows the character of what kind of people we are … it just shows the character. I mean, time will tell. This just shows me his true character, so I bet this is how you want him to play it, cool. Wait until he loses – just time will tell. That’s all I’ll say.”
For now though Adesanya will look to get back to winning ways by defending his 185lb belt, and meanwhile Jones is now north of 245lbs as he prepares himself for a heavyweight title shot later in the year against the winner of Stipe Miocic vs. Francis Ngannou II.
