Exactly my thoughts at the time…
Sounds about right…
I remember well Francis saying over and over how he wanted that fight and Jones basically dick tucking.
There is also a rumour that it might be a two fight deal with one fight in Boxing and one in MMA.
That would be very interesting to me!
In a bizzaro world Fran beats Deyontay in boxing and Fran loses in mma!
I saw Aoki get KOed by a boxer in MMA when he rushed in
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and who could forget this as well!
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Tim was retarded. He should have clinched immediately. He probably would have gotten a trip and could have T bagged him with his sharts
Tim also broke the rule that it was supposed to be fists only in this fight as they were only fighting under MMA rules because they couldn’t get a Boxing licence.
Look at Mercer’s face after Tim threw the inside leg kick. Probably what got him so mad that he KOed him!
You are right though in an MMA fight Tim should have clinched especially against a Boxer with legit KO power.
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Hello Sir James. Long time no see.
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Barry!
It’s been a while!
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Meh, I can tell you exactly how that fight plays out. JJ takes him down and keeps the tits in the face GSP style, for 25 fkn minutes. No thanks.
This, they agreed to punches only then Tim opens up with an inside leg kick lol. Karma was perfect that night.
64ford on the old site had the best Tim Sylvia stories as he actually trained with the guy.
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is dana afraid jon will get drunk and drive over the president?
but seriuosly i wonder why dana thinks its too risky
When you have a 1300 hp motor in your car it might grenade at any minute, but you take that chance instead of driving a reliable 200 HP car
Conor was the same weight as everyone he fought. If anyone get’s an asterisk for “he was unfairly bigger than his competition” it is definitely Francis.
BJ was allowed and tried. Anderson was too until he pissed off Dana with the Maia fight.
Why would Francis get a privilege that no one ever got? Conor only got it because the UFC co promoted, which was not what Francis wanted.
He fought the corpses of great, legendary fighters from years past. None of those people is as scary as Jon in 2020+.
Francis being the champion after that travesty of a fight with Gane and striking like this reduced the legitimacy more than anything else that could possibly happen:
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And Jones will be older and uber rusty. So hopefully Aspinall has a chance to blitz him on the white house lawn 
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White thought Jones vs Aspinall was a done deal and told everyone the fight would happen. But Jones changed his mind. According to Ariel Helwani Jones didn’t think the UFC would meet his asking price and he could blame them for the fight not happening. But the UFC met his asking price and Jones chose to retire rather than face Aspinall.
Jones was supposed to headline UFC 200 but was removed from the card due to a potential anti-doping violation, Jones declined to fight Chael Sonnen on short notice leading to UFC 151 being cancelled, etc.
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Not on fight night though!
Yeah that’s why I didn’t mention BJ but Aldo wasn’t allowed either if I remember correctly although it has been a while.
Because he was the heavyweight champion and the UFC wanted to keep it’s lineal champion for the integrity of the sport.
Letting him box once (win or lose) wouldn’t really have done the company much harm IMHO.
I grant that they were not in their primes but still had legit power in their hands which Jon doesn’t and never did.
His takedown defence against Stipe in the second fight IMHO scared Jon a bit. Had he been taken down easily but still won I think Jon would have jumped at the chance to have him on his resume.
Just my 2 cents as you Americans like to say!
True but wasn’t Francis carrying a really bad knee injury into that fight which he blamed for his performance?
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Maybe. Most guys are cutting the same 10% of body weight. At most he’s have 5 pounds over people at 145.
I don’t remember the Aldo one, but it wouldn’t surprise me.
I respectfully disagree with this. Jon knows Stipe isn’t even close to the level of wrestling he has. Stipe looked awful in that fight. I would be amazed if Jon saw that fight and thought anything other than “I can murder either of these guys.”
People always have an excuse for why they look like shit. He looked worse against Lewis, his knee was fine that time. Jon was old, fat, in a new weight class, and coming off a 3 year layoff when fought Gane, and we saw how that went.
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Also had a significant height and reach advantage too at featherweight.
- Jose Aldo was not allowed to challenge for the UFC Lightweight Championship while holding the Featherweight title because the UFC required champions seeking a title shot in a different weight class to relinquish their current belt first. This policy was enforced despite Aldo’s camp, including his coach Andre Pederneiras, lobbying the UFC for years to allow him to hold both titles simultaneously.
100% Jon is a way better wrestler than Stipe no sane person would disagree with that.
I look at it as Ngannou’s takedown defence was so shit in the first Stipe fight but there a massive improvement in the second one.
So it stands to reason it could potentially improve even further by the time he faces Jones because if he can’t take Francis down and keep him there then it’s going to be an issue.
True there are always excuses legitimate or not but against Lewis I do think he was genuinely gun shy after what happened with Stipe in the first fight.
Styles make fights and 100% Jon Jones is a better MMA fighter than Francis when it comes to grappling and that showed against Gane.
Unfortunately Jones vs Ngannou is likely a fight we will never see unless Turki offers insane money for both of them to fight which he hinted at a few months a go I think?
He should come out in a Red Coat just to be a prick
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The ppv incentives were certainly unobtainable for Francis. He couldn’t sell water to a thirsty man in a desert.
Did he? Isn’t he 1-2 since leaving the UFC? He couldn’t even keep the honorary title of “satrap of African affairs” or whatever bullshit title PFL gave him. His kid has died, he killed another kid with his car…it’s not like things have gone great for him. Yay, some saudi lost millions on a big payday for him. They sold 75,000 ppvs in the US for the Fury fight and like 5000 for the Joshua fight. Those are insanely pathetic numbers. Now everyone realizes he wasn’t worth it and he’ll likely never fight again.
If he fights twice year in the UFC, going back to after beating stipe, he probably has more money over the 8 fights he’d have had by now than the 3 he actually fought.