Joe Rogan believes UFC 285 cemented Jon Jones as the MMA GOAT.
Jones ended his three-year-long layoff and moved up to heavyweight to face Ciryl Gane at UFC 285. It was a highly-anticipated fight and it didn’t last long as Jones submitted Gane in the first round to become the new heavyweight champion.
Heading into the fight, many already thought Jones was the GOAT, but after the win, Rogan says it’s undeniable that Jones is the GOAT.
Joe Rogan on Jon Jones
“Jon Jones is the GOAT,” Rogan said on the Joe Rogan Experience. “Now, it’s undeniable. There was all this debate until he submitted Ciryl Gane and became the heavyweight champion. No one can f*** with that. The Francis [Ngannou] fight exposed one aspect of his (Gane’s) game that you’re never gonna beat Jon in, and that’s the wrestling. Then everybody said, ‘Well, he didn’t know that Francis was gonna wrestle him.’ Given, Francis is not the caliber of wrestler or even in the realm of Jon Jones.”
“Jon has been wrestling since he was 12 years old. He took down Daniel Cormier who is an Olympic-level wrestler. There is not a guy in the world that can say that you can start wrestling at 29 years old. You’d have to be the freakiest of freak athletes to compete with that guy.”
Although many are still critical of the failed drug tests of Jones, Rogan says even with that, ‘Bones’ is still the best ever.
“You can’t accidentally beat Jon Jones,” Rogan said. “He’s GOAT over everybody now. Khabib [Nurmagomedov] is in the conversation, “Mighty Mouse” [Demetrious Johnson] is in that conversation, too. The only problem is — besides [Henry] Cejudo and a couple other guys like [Joseph] Benavidez, he (Johnson) was not dealing with guys that were of the caliber of guys that Jones was facing. He was facing the elite of the elite and he never f****** lost even when he was doing coke and he wasn’t even training. That’s how goddamn good Jones is.”
