Best "safety and defense": Jones, GSP or Aldo

[Gregoire1]

Three great champions, their credo was (is) strong defense, not-risky fighting and outworking opponent to the decision. How do you rank their abilities to avoid risks in their respective primes?

 

[Dragon Punch]

That was GSPs whole game.

 

[phipps66]

Gsp

 

[llperez22]

gsp easily. He did whatever he had to minimize risky situations. Koshceck had KO power and was loading up with one eye shut and gsp never went for kill instead jabbing him to death. When he fought shields, he knew shields had terrible stand up but was legit on the ground so gsp circled and out struck him avoiding getting close. When he fought guys diaz, he had tons of dominant ground positions but refused to risk giving up position to try and a sub. i can go on and on. Gsp was the safest dominant fighter we have seen. I actually credit him for it while others talk about it as a negative.

 

[EliteLurker]

0/10.

 

[sonofbrodin]

Gsp

 

[cungfu]

GSP.

Jon Jones shouldn't be in the discussion, because he actually beats fighters in their own game. That requires some risk at least.

 

[Squarechoke]

GSP.

Jon Jones shouldn't be in the discussion, because he actually beats fighters in their own game. That requires some risk at least.

GSP stood for significant amount of time with the best strikers he's fought as well. It's pretty dishonest arguing to try to make it out to be that GSP instantly took down strikers and only stood with ground specialists.

 

[CTYankee]

Before you make a thread about Jones, you should watch some of his fights.

 

[Kerseyvsgiggler]

Aldo's work is about keeping it standing and kickboxing. GSP was a shutdown artist locking guys out of there "riddim" for 5 rounds at a time. Jones is all about being bigger than the competition on both physical and psychological levels. (Running away isn't good defense)

 

[Boxingislife]

Its absolutely NOT Jones

Jones in his last few fights has been hit MORE, CLEANER and harder than GSP ever had in all his fights combined up until Hendricks

Jones has legit terrible boxing defense, and terrible footwork

This is what happpened to Jones the first time he fought a prime opponent who could strike and move

 

[Boxingislife]

Seriously, Jones has legit garbage boxing, garbage defensive fundamentals, garbage footwork, and ZERO countering.

Every single gif is from a different exchange..no repeats. In fact Gus out struck Jones by something comically wide like 190 strikes to 90. It WAS BAD

 

[INTERL0PER]

Hey look, there's Boxingislife hating on Jones. Again.

Dude, we get it, Jones' boxing isn't very good, we don't need a wall of gifs reminding us. But besides the Gus fight (and the DC fight to a certain extent), Jones has gone through most of his fights relatively untouched. To have fought Shogun, Lyoto, Rampage, Vitor etc and come out the other side unscathed says you're doing something right defensively.


But as everyone's already said, GSP is the defensive king. He actually far more active offense wise than a lot of people give him credit for, but he was definitely risk averse. A pretty smart strategy to take in to a cage fight, IMO.

 

[HelloJapan]

Gsp.

 

[PapaBherd]

GSP especially pre-ACL surgery.

 

[BigDaddyBach]

Id have to say Ronda's defense against Cyborg: run to a different org, buddy up with them and have them create a weight class at which the only legitimate competitor cannot compete at. In the event anyone becomes wise to this strategy, slander the opponent and have your legions of hopeful pimple faced virgin fans pick up the slander for you.

 

[Boxingislife]

Hey look, there's Boxingislife hating on Jones. Again.

Dude, we get it, Jones' boxing isn't very good, we don't need a wall of gifs reminding us. But besides the Gus fight (and the DC fight to a certain extent), Jones has gone through most of his fights relatively untouched. To have fought Shogun, Lyoto, Rampage, Vitor etc and come out the other side unscathed says you're doing something right defensively.


But as everyone's already said, GSP is the defensive king. He actually far more active offense wise than a lot of people give him credit for, but he was definitely risk averse. A pretty smart strategy to take in to a cage fight, IMO.

Jones is terrible defensively. He was unscathed against his opponents prior to Gus, because they were all so much smaller and worn out. Not to mention that most of those fights majorly took place on the ground where they simply didn't have the opportunity to land on Jones on the feet

Even then, Glover was landing on Jones a lot until Jones broke his arm with that armlock. Also despite Shogun being injuried and that fight being 98% on the ground Shogun still did manage to land a couple 1-2s and right leads on Jones. Machida DID also ROCK Jones in their 1st round. Jones was rocked by a head kick from Rashad. And Jones did run from Rampage on the feet. Jones has always been suspect in skill and very hittable. Gus amplified it and really brought his flaws to light

I agree with you fully about GSP though

 

[irishmac22]

GSP was the greatest champion the ufc ever had. He worked hard. He spoke to everyone with respect. Charitable, humble on and on. If you wanted to fight at range (Diaz) GSP got close. You want to go to the ground (Shields) GSP punched and kicked. And when he was forced to fight too his opponents strength (Hughes 2) GSP beat you there.

 

[irishmac22]

Every one of these clips show JJs best weapon. Eye poking.

 

[Loisaida]

If you look at the most damaging fights these guys have been in, it goes:

GSP: Hendricks, Condit, Serra
Jones: DC, Gus, Vitor
Aldo: Mendes II, Hominick

Obviously this isn't exact, but if I had to put them in order, over their entire UFC careers, I'd say:

1. Aldo
2. GSP
3. Jones