Israel Adesanya believes Jon Jones knows he is a threat
Israel Adesanya has had nothing but success since joining the UFC ranks. The New Zealander has an incredible calendar year which saw him go 5-0 and is now fighting for the interim middleweight title at UFC 236.
Ultimately, Adesanya’s style reminded many of Anderson Silva, which Adesanya beat in the main event of UFC 234. Now, however, Adesanya is eyeing a different challenge, a challenge not even in his division. That challenge is to take on arguably the greatest of all-time in Jon Jones.
“Jones and Silva have spoken about fighting each other for years as well, but that never came to fruition,” Adesanya said on Submission Radio. “This I feel is different. So yeah, I look forward to that challenge as well.”
Although Adesanya is currently in the middleweight division, he would have no problem moving up to fight Jones. He would be the much smaller fighter but he knows his striking would be a lot to handle for anybody. As well, Jones even brought up the possibility of fighting Adesanya sometime soon during UFC 235 fight week. That caught the attention of Adesanya.
“That shows you how serious they’re taking me, the smart ones, how much they know I’m a threat, how serious they’re taking me,” Adesanya said.
“Like, [Jones] mentioned it on fight week of 235 or whatever, and then I went back two weeks prior on messages with Eugene when I put the question out there, how are we going to beat Jon Jones? And he kind of just laid down the rough blueprint. And I blurred a lot of it out, but yeah, we’re focusing on Gastelum.”
For now, Adesanya is fighting for the interim middleweight belt. And if all goes well will look to unify that belt later on this year. As for Jones, it is expected that he will fight Thiago Santos in his next title defense. Even though the two are in different divisions, it seems like the two are on a collision course for each other.
