UFC legend and former two-weight class champion Jon Jones is singing a conciliatory tune as he continues to campaign for a spot on next year’s UFC White House card.
Jones, who vacated the UFC’s heavyweight title earlier this year and announced his retirement, quickly changed his tune about hanging up the gloves after the White House card was announced.
UFC CEO and President Dana White, who had earlier insisted a fight between Jones and Tom Aspinall would happen, has been steadfast in refusing to put Jones name on the line-up for the event. To be fair, no line-up has actually been announced, but White has publicly stated he would not put Jones on the card, due to the myriad of issues, including cancellations, “Bones” has been responsible for.
Now, in an interview with the No Scripts podcast, Jones has admitted fault, to some extent, in a verbal agreement for a fight with Aspinall falling through.
“I think my most immediate goal is to try to be on the White House card,” Jones said in a videotaped appearance on the podcast, released in full on Thursday. Yet asked if he’d spoken to White about it, “I’m giving Dana his space,” he replied.
“Dana has changed my life. He’s changed my life, he’s changed my children’s lives. I’m forever grateful to him. We had a verbal agreement that didn’t go over well, nothing was finalized, but I do admit guilt- not guilt, but I was wrong.”
“The way things went down, I was wrong. And I wish that I could see him face-to-face and just apologize to him so that we can let bygones be bygones and get back to making some major money for the sport, and really entertaining these fans.”
Jones reportedly turned down $30 million to face Aspinall, a number Ariel Helwani revealed on Logan Paul’s Impaulsive podcast. With Aspinall now the UFC’s undisputed champion and looking at a rematch with Ciryl Gane next year, Jones is back to targeting a fight with light heavyweight champ Alex Pereira.
“I feel like, either way that fight were to go, no one loses in that fight,” Jones said on facing the Brazilian, a former champ at middleweight and two-time light heavyweight champion. “It generates so many millions for the sport. There’s just no losing when you have such high level people competing who respect each other.”
Will White bite at Jones’ latest petition to fight on the White House card? We likely won’t know until sometime in the new year.
