Ali Abdelaziz is stirring the pot when it comes to the pound-for-pound rankings, claiming that Jon Jones should actually rank behind newly crowned welterweight champion Belal Muhammad. While Dana White has been vocally defending the undisputed heavyweight champion’s status as the pound-for-pound greatest for a while now—despite pushback from the media—Abdelaziz isn’t buying it.
In a recent interview, he argued that Jones‘ position should be reconsidered and that Belal has earned his spot ahead of the legendary fighter.
Ahead of this weekend’s fights, Abdelaziz sat down with Kevin Iole for an interview where he talked about how the GOAT debate is so much different from the P4P debate.
“It is two different conversations. If you say greatest of all time, you can say Jon Jones, you can say Khabib, you can say GSP. But if you talk about the current pound-for-pound best fighter in the world, I don’t think it is Jon Jones even before Belal. I don’t think he is before the guys that have been active. He hasn’t fought for three years. You can not be a pound-for-pound number one.”
View this post on Instagram
The only common point of contention for most people against White is that Jones has not been active enough to retain the top spot. Sure, he is one of the best to ever do it, but that does not factor in when the pound-for-pound rankings are being made.
With the rankings always a hot topic in MMA, it’ll be interesting to see how this debate unfolds and if Jones can regain the top spot in the eyes of fans and analysts alike at UFC 309.
Is Jones ducking Aspinall?
The quick answer depends on who one asks the question. If they go to the interim UFC heavyweight champion, the answer would be a resounding yes. If they go to Dana White, they will be ‘dumb’ and ‘clowns’, ‘people who don’t know anything’ etc etc. There might even be a rant about how boxing isn’t profitable or something, even though it’s not related to the question.
But if one wants to hear it from the horse’s mouth…
Well, too bad, they can’t because Jones has practically be ducking that question for ages. Is he going to fight if he wins over Miocic at MSG in November? He has many a time indicated about that being his swan song.
But, never say never. This is a sport of the great unpredictables. Who knows, Miocic might pull a rabbit out of his fireman hat and Jones might have to fight for his legacy again.
