Jon Jones responded to Tony Ferguson’s callout late Tuesday night, and when he did, he cut deep.
Ferguson, the former UFC interim lightweight champion, took to Twitter earlier Tuesday in the wee hours of the morning and issued an out-of-nowhere callout of Jones, referencing a something that may or may not have happened with the UFC light heavyweight champ in college.
Jones, blindsided by this, responded with a quote tweet in which he seemingly took a shot at Ferguson’s well documented mental health issues from earlier this year.
“Wait, when did this beef start?!? I thought we were cool!! You over there feeling suicidal Tony?” Jones tweeted.
When Jones’ tweet was met with heavy criticism from fans, he deleted it after about 30 minutes and issued an initial apology that has also since-been deleted.
“Definitely should’ve used a better choice of words, deleted that last tweet. My fault, I’m sorry guys,” Jones tweeted.
Jones followed up that apology tweet with a second one.
“Definitely knew nothing about my guy having any mental health issues, I do now though,” Jones tweeted. “I apologize for my response back to him and moving on.”
When a Twitter user expressed doubt about Jones playing ignorant, Jones fired back with a quote tweet doubling down that he never knew of Ferguson’s recent past.
“Yeah bro, I just show up and kick a few asses a few times a year,” Jones tweeted. “Don’t really sit around and read other fighters [sic] articles.”
Ferguson’s case became public last March after MMA Junkie broke the news of his wife filing a restraining order against him. In it, she she described Ferguson’s “paranoid and delusional” behavior, including that he “kept throwing holy water” at her and tearing up their fire place because he believed “someone was inside his walls.” She also said Ferguson pushed her and her mother.
Ferguson’s wife later dropped the restraining order after he received treatment. In May, he was cleared by the UFC to return and booked to fight Donald Cerrone in June at UFC 238, where he won by second-round TKO.
Ferguson, who’s on a 12-fight winning streak, currently sits as the No. 1 contender to the lightweight title. He’s in line to challenge champion Khabib Nurmagomedov, who’s stated he’d like to make the fight for February or March 2020.
Jones, meanwhile, had been hoping to fight once more this year after defending his title twice in 2019, but that appears unlikely to happen. He’s now targeting a return for early 2020.
Earlier this month, Jones took a plea deal in his hometown of Albuquerque, N.M., pleading no contest to disorderly conduct for an April incident at a local strip club where a cocktail waitress alleged he grabbed her vagina and picked her up off the ground.
Jon Jones asks Tony Ferguson if he's 'feeling suicidal' in response to callout, apologizes for tweet
