With the pound-for-pound debate raging on, former UFC interim lightweight champion Dustin Poirier has cleared the air, divulging his thoughts about the Jon Jones vs Islam Makhachev debate. Poirier who faced the LW champ, Makhachev inside the cage has opened up and given his thoughts on where the Russian stands in the mix.
Speaking to Ariel Helwani on The MMA Hour podcast, ‘The Diamond’ opened up and named Jon Jones as the top dog, while Makhachev became the second fiddle. Acknowledging Helwani’s question of who is the real P4P king, Poirier said,
“That’s tough, man, that’s tough cos Jon Jones has never been beat, that’s tough, top 2, yeah.”
Despite suffering a round 5 loss against the Dagestani, Poirier still has Jon ‘Bones’ Jones at the top of the list! Well, you can’t argue with that as long as Jones is still around, at least that’s what Uncle Dana (White) had to say.
However, Poirier proved his point, mentioning the fact that, Jones till this point hasn’t lost a fight and he cleaned out the light heavyweight division during a time when the division was filled with killers.
Meanwhile, even though Poirier was put to sleep when Makhachev locked in the D’arce choke, he named the Russian’s mentor/friend Khabib Nurmagomedov as the stronger among the two.
Dustin Poirier hails ‘The Eagle’ as the strongest despite succumbing to his protege’s “vice grip”
Having faced both the current and former lightweight champion, Dustin Poirier is the perfect guy to enquire about the two. Appearing on Monday’s iteration of The MMA Hour, Poirier opened up, essentially mentioning that Nurmagomedov was the stronger one. Though, he complimented Makhachev’s grip strength, saying that it was like a “vice grip,” he felt like ‘The Eagle’ was physically stronger.
He added that the strategy of both fighters is almost similar with pressure being the name of the game. Both go for takedowns in an effort to drown their opponents with relentless wrestling. However, Poirier feels like Makhachev, unlike Khabib, does more clinch work while the undefeated Russian prefers to keep his distance and “shoot for lower shots.”
