Jon Jones and Alex Pereira might be the collab of the century.
Current UFC light heavyweight champion Pereira met face-to-face with the former, Jones, who left 205lbs for a future at heavyweight. Jones left and never returned, capturing his second title in his heavyweight debut against Ciryl Gane, later to defend against Stipe Miocic at UFC 309 this November.
In his last few fights, Pereira has talked about moving up a division and as a result, creating a lot of fanfare of what a fight between “Poatan” and the legendary “Bones” would look like in the not-so-distant future.
Unfortunately, we have to come down from that reality as Jones looks to be retiring after his next bout against Stipe Miocic, not honoring the wishes of one Tom Aspinall, the interim champion, nor the fans clamoring for title unification.
Pereira Believes He’ll Get The Chance To Train With Jon Jones
Realizing he may, too, lose out on the chance of ever fighting Jones, Pereira isn’t giving up hope that he’ll cross paths with Jones someway or another.
“We’re both sitting down first row next to each other, and we’ve been talking a bit about training together for a long time, but I think now it’s gonna happen,” Pereira told Full Send MMA of meeting Jones at UFC 306.
Pereira On Timeline For Spars: “I Wanna Get His Experience…”
Exactly two months out from Jones’ potential retirement fight at UFC 309, Pereira is gearing up for his third-straight title defense against Khalil Rountree Jr. at UFC 307 a month earlier on Oct. 5. Should the Brazilian get things done once again, Pereira has thrown in his name to be one of Jones’ sparring partners for what could be his final training camp of his career.
“Think so because his fight’s gonna be in November,” Pereira said of possibly training with Jones before Nov. 16. “Every time I leave a fight, it takes a week or two sometimes for me to recover small injuries, but I think I’ll have enough time to to to go over there.
“Jones is heavyweight size. I feel like I’m heavyweight size, too. Today, I saw him more athletic, more fit since he last fought. He looks really good. I wanna get his experience. People talk about us fighting, but sometimes people say that he’s gonna fight one time or twice more and I don’t know if I’ll be able to share the cage with him, but at least I wanna get the experience of training with him.”
If it’s not the Octagon that awaits Alex Pereira and Jon Jones, perhaps it’s the next best thing: the sparring room. Just ask Sean Strickland, who has sparred former foe Pereira on a couple of occasions following their fight at UFC 276 in 2022.
