Dana White doesn’t think it would be the worst idea if Jon Jones called it a career.
Speaking to TMZ, White said he isn’t opposed to booking Jones for another appearance, but if the former light heavyweight champion decides he’s done competing, the UFC boss says that wouldn’t necessarily be a bad thing.
“That’s up to Jon,” White said. “He could absolutely fight again at 205 pounds. He said he wouldn’t fight Stipe (Miocic), and now Derrick (Lewis) and Francis (Ngannou) are fighting, so we’ll see how that fight plays out. There’s nothing wrong with going out on top either – Jon Jones is undefeated, he’s never been beat.
“For those people that don’t know, you see that one loss on his record, he didn’t lose that fight. He won that fight in dominant fashion like most of his fights. It was a time when the Nevada Athletic Commission was at its weakest, and there was a referee that shouldn’t have been in there, and he stole that fight from Jon Jones. So, it wouldn’t be a bad thing for him to go out on top.”
White has never shied away from calling Jones the greatest of all time, but their relationship has been rocky in recent times. After Jones asked for a better contract to move up to heavyweight and challenge champion Francis Ngannou, the highly anticipated superfight started to fall apart. As a result, White moved on to Lewis, who’s projected to run things back with Ngannou sometime in August.
The UFC president recently suggested the idea of a No. 1 contender bout between Jones (26-1 MMA, 20-1 UFC) and former heavyweight champ Miocic (20-4 MMA, 14-4 UFC), but Jones said he is not interested. So with Jones shutting that option down, White claimed that Miocic will now get the winner of Ngannou vs. Lewis, leaving “Bones” in a quandary.
Dana White on Jon Jones’ future with the UFC: It wouldn’t be a bad thing for him to go out on top