Jon Jones appears to be a perfect combat sports combo of skill, strength, and evil. That one-two-three punch hasn’t always benefited Jones or those around him outside the fight game, what with all the accusations of assault and various other malfeasance made against him since the late naughties, when he first came into the public eye.
But inside the cage, well, good god. To clarify: Good fucking god.
Late Saturday night at Madison Square Garden, Jones stopped lesser legend Stipe Miocic and reminded everybody who cares about MMA that he’s the best there ever was. Now 37 years old and in the middle of a seriously inert patch in his career, Jones proved he can still put on a show like nobody else who destroys other human beings for a living. Jones retained his UFC heavyweight belt and added another chilling clip to his already scary-great highlight reel while KO’ing Miocic with a spinning back kick to the challenger’s torso in the third round.
The kick was delivered with such speed and landed with such force I swear I could see and hear Miocic’s ribs breaking. It was the most brutal attack to a midsection shown on live television since Jack Ruby vs. Lee Harvey Oswald in November 1963. Miocic, 42, crumpled in agony from the bodyblow and was saved from further destruction by referee Herb Dean, who dived in and waved off the bout. Jones casually walked away from the pile of wounded flesh, smiling, as a bad, bad man would.
Or maybe just like someone who'd done it all before. This is a guy who fought seven times in his first year as a pro, winning them all, and became the youngest UFC champ ever at just 23 years old. He’s lost once in his career, and even that is disputed, coming by disqualification against Matt Hamill stop after the referee ruled Jones illegally delivered so-called “12-6 elbows” to his opponents head when he was down. (That type of headshot was recently legalized in the UFC, which should only enhance Jones's legacy.)The only other blotch on Jones’s fight record came after his 2017 KO of former UFC champ Daniel Cormier, when steroids were subsequently found in his pee and the bout was declared a no-contest.
But he’s had trouble finding motivation to fight, and fighters worthy of his time in recent years. Before taking on Miocic, which was only his second outing as a UFC heavyweight, Jones had had only two fights in the last five and a half years. When he doffed all garments but his short shorts at the end of his long cagewalk, Jones looked much thicker than he had in his light-heavyweight heyday.
Miocic hasn’t been all that busy either; he hadn’t fought since getting KO’d by Francis Ngannou nearly three years ago. As soon as Dean got things going by yelling, “Fight,” Jones began proving the talent disparity between him and Miocic was so vast that this fight never should have even been made. Jones threw the 240-pound Ohio firefighter to the mat with frightening ease just a minute and a half into the bout, then spent the rest of the first round landing violent elbows to Miocic’s head and draining the will to fight out of his opponent. Jones did appear less aggressive in the second and third rounds, perhaps due to his inactivity or the added thickness he carried into the cage. Maybe he was just bored. But Miocic didn’t take advantage of the reduced work rate. And then Jones kicked whatever puncher’s chance Miocic may have had right out of the arena with his spinning left leg to the gut, did a little dance for Donald Trump sitting ringside, and everybody's night was over.
Not that many years ago, Miocic’s peers were calling him the greatest heavyweight in MMA history. He will not hear that again.
