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Another chapter in the directionless, curious UFC feud between Rashad Evans & Jon Jones
By Zach Arnold | May 21, 2011
KENNY RICE: “First off, let’s clear the air, that’s what we do here. No innuendos, no Internet gossip. What happened? Rashad Evans, Jon Jones meet up in a night club in Las Vegas, a few words were exchanged. What were those words? What really happened?”
RASHAD EVANS: “What really happened was just that, you know, me and Jon was in the same area, we’re at the same table with a bunch of other fighters and, you know, he said, ‘can I speak to you privately?’ So, we stepped to the side and we spoke privately and, you know, privately first thing he says is like, ‘Listen, I want to clear the air,’ and I’m thinking like, ah, you know, this is cool, young guy’s being very mature about the whole thing. And then he starts off by saying, ‘You know, I think things are going too far, but I want to be the first to tell you that I’m going to destroy you, I’m going to show that you’re washed up in the sport, I’m going to show that I am the best Light Heavyweight ever and I’m going to show what the new breed of fighting is and you’re going to be my first highlight knockout.’ And I was just… I like, at first I was like, did he just really say this? So I could nothing but just like laugh and then I’m just like, heh heh, I was like, ‘How do you figure so?’ And he said, ‘Well, because when were training you know I would catch you with elbows and I would catch with knees here and there,’ and I’m like, ‘dude, I was hoping you’d get ready for Ryan Bader, I wasn’t trying to beat you, I wasn’t trying to really go at you, I was just trying to help you.’ And I said, ‘but you do remember when I went with you and I held you down and I slapped you and punched in the face and I was beating you in practice and you begged me, can you get up, and then I said if you quit now you’ll quit in the fight, so I made you work back up to your feet, you remember that?’ and he’s like, ‘yeah.’ So, I mean, we just went back and forth for a while. But the whole thing I said to him is like this, I said Jon, ‘you know, I know you believe what you believe and that’s great that you believe it, but given the opportunity that you had to fight me you chose not to and that’s the bottom line, you chose not to fight me. I was there to fight you, I said I’ll fight you, you chose not to fight me. So, it kind of like ended there.”
KENNY RICE: “That was it, but no pushing? No screaming?”
RASHAD EVANS: “No, it was actually a pretty controlled conversation like neither one of us got to the point where it was like any blows were going to be fired or anything like that. When it came down to that, he just ended up leaving the table area and going home or going wherever, but it was never to the point where we were going to fight each other.”
KENNY RICE: “Okay, we did by the way try to get in touch with Jon Jones and asked if he would like to comment on the situation. He has decline at this time, so we got Rashad’s side of the story.”
RASHAD EVANS: “Yeah, I mean…”
KENNY RICE: “Nothing broken? No lamps knocked down, no waitresses thrown through a window, so everything is good.”
RASHAD EVANS: “Yeah, I mean with Jon, it’s this right here: Jon is a young guy and, you know, he’s on top of the world right now and everybody’s telling him he’s as great as this and great as that… and it’s hard to not to let that seep in for anybody, you know. You try to be humble but at the same time when you’re told that you’re this and you’re that and how great you are, it’ll seep in (even) the most humble person’s body.”
Topics: Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 7 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |
First Rashad was complaining that Jones wasn’t refusing to fight him. Now he’s complaining that he did.
Rashad didn’t need to get anywhere near as worked up about this whole situation.
Jon Jones ducked Rashad Evans. It’s as simple as that. And if he wasn’t ducking him, he would have fought him in August.
Or he just didn’t want to fight in August. Just like his manager said when they tried to get the fight scheduled for October or September.
The guy fought twice in two months. I think a lot of people forget that.
Zuffa needs to cancel the Davis-Evans fight. Nothing good can happen from delaying Evans-Jones.
What if Jones hurts himself in his next bout and end up out for another 9 months?
The fight can’t realy get bigger than it already is.
Make them fight now.
Agreed.
You don’t cancel Evans/Davis because Evans NEEDS to fight. Let’s say they cancel Evans/Davis and re-schedules Evans/Jones for September/October…then Jones hurts his hand again…that’s an additional 3-4 months Evans has gone without a fight on top of the year he has already been out…and he STILL hasn’t fought for the title. Jones/Evans will happen if it’s meant to happen…it may not be when everyone wants it..but it’ll happen.
What’s going on here is against every thing Dana did to make a success out of the UFC.
-Make the champion face the number one contender every fight
-Don’t delay “rivalry fight”
For a guy who have promoted the idea of teammate versus teammate fight for so long, now he has one and he walks away from it? You think Vince McMahon would walk away from this fight?
The thing is I really don’t believe that 2 injury prone fighter are going to fight separately and then both of them are going to be healthy to fight 5 month later. I don’t. This could be Liddell-Silva 2.0. 2 guys fighting each other without a belt in the line and after the rivalry is dead.