Is Jones mentally weak?

[RedDevilFan]

I saw this being discussed and I was curious. Now, Jones is a professional fighter and one of the GOATs so he's infinitely mentally tougher than me and most people but in the context of the sport, do you think he is?
Refusing to fight Sonnen short notice.
Partying one week before every fight as a safety net.
Refusing to fight Cormier at heavyweight cause it would give DC the advantage.
Current ducking of Aspinall.

Nothing Jones has done in the octagon tells us that he is mentally weak in the cage. A mentally weak fighter would have shown that he is mentally weak in the octagon. Very few MMA fighters are mentally weak in terms of fighting, as it takes a tough man or woman to get hit in face for a living.

Jones is willing to let his limbs snap in half before he will tap. You are calling a fighter who fought cheal with a broken toe that snapped, mentally weak. Jon has mentioned that he would rather let his limbs snap before he taps to strikes and would die in the cage. He has always been known to be a bit of a psychopath in the octagon. . He is what we call too competitive, and when you are too competitive it shows in other forms. Jones has a personality that is high emotional reactivity (high neuroticism) and introverted tendencies (low extroversion) are more likely to experience anxiety than other personality types.

If you want to talk about this shit properly rather than trolling, which is what I think you are doing, then go ask the experts.

 

[Marko Polo]

Not really

Cheating about 6x using steroids
Ducking fights vs Ngannou, Rumble, Aspinall
Refusing to fight Chael Sonnen on short notice
Cheating in the cage for 90% of his career which created the necessity for a rule change
Refusing to show any kind of respect or acknowledgement to his competitors

 

[Ares Black]

Cheating about 6x using steroids
Ducking fights vs Ngannou, Rumble, Aspinall
Refusing to fight Chael Sonnen on short notice
Cheating in the cage for 90% of his career which created the necessity for a rule change
Refusing to show any kind of respect or acknowledgement to his competitors

I don't know if any of that is evidence of mental weakness TBH

 

[TerraRayzing]

Nothing Jones has done in the octagon tells us that he is mentally weak in the cage. A mentally weak fighter would have shown that he is mentally weak in the octagon. Very few MMA fighters are mentally weak in terms of fighting, as it takes a tough man or woman to get get hit in face for a living.

Jones is willing to let his limbs snap in half before he will tap. You are calling a fighter who fought cheal with a broken toe that snapped, mentally weak. Jon has mentioned that he would rather let his limbs snap before he taps to strikes and would die in the cage. He has always been known to be a bit of a psychopath in the octagon. . He is what we call too competitive, and when you are too competitive it shows in other forms. Jones has a personality that is high emotional reactivity (high neuroticism) and introverted tendencies (low extroversion) are more likely to experience anxiety than other personality types.

If you want to talk about this shit properly rather than trolling is what I am thinking you are doing, then go ask the experts.

I agree with you. I think Jones is super careful about protecting his undefeated record but if Aspinall tried to fight him out, Jones would go ham in a heartbeat.
Chill out tho. It's not trolling to ask a question.

 

[Marko Polo]

I don't know if any of that is evidence of mental weakness TBH

How about partying before fights to give himself an excuse if he lost
Crying on TV when he got caught drug cheating again
Assaulting his wife

I could go on dude. Obviously he doesn’t want to do any of those things, but he can’t help himself anyway. That’s mental weakness and you can spin it however way you want

 

[AmonTobin]

He's always been inauthentic and dishonest. So maybe more accurately, he’s morally weak. I think he fits the traits of a vulnerable narcissist. Evidenced by how he deals with criticism and well documented instances of harm to others while always maintaining his own self interests and self preservation. I’ve just described 25% of the general population.

If others wrote about their first hand knowledge and personal experiences with Jones, it would probably be fascinating but if Jones wrote an autobiography, you know it would be insufferable.

 

[Cartiac]

I don't think that he is mentally weak, but his ego dominates his psyche, and he only makes move that will protect it.

I may understand what you are trying to get at, but there is no way some one only making moves to protect their ego fights Shogun Hua, Rampage Jackson, Lyoto Machida, Rashad Evans, and Vitor Belfort, all UFC Champions, all MMA elite, all within 1.5 years at 23-24 years old.

Jon Jones admittedly has self esteem/confidence issues but he fears no one but himself as that is the only person that can defeat him. Well, also maybe some of those child raping priests up in the Northeast.

 

[Ares Black]

How about partying before fights to give himself an excuse if he lost
Crying on TV when he got caught drug cheating again
Assaulting his wife

I could go on dude. Obviously he doesn’t want to do any of those things, but he can’t help himself anyway. That’s mental weakness and you can spin it however way you want

All bad behavior, certainly

But he is also arguably the greatest cage fighter in history. A mentally weak person is not capable of that level of accomplishment IMO.

 

[GordoBarraBJJ]

Mentally he comes off as a complete psychopath

 

[Staph infection]

Chael said the same thing. Fighting Jon was like being mauled by an animal

TS should go to Albuquerque, sign the waiver, and show us his sparring footage

I mean just the fact that he is happy to spam oblique kicks at all of his opponents shows how truly he is sick and does not care about hurting others. I know they are a legal move but you do not see a lot of fighters use them but good ole Bones Jones loves to.

 

[HHJ]

I don't know if any of that is evidence of mental weakness TBH

I mean the roids def help your mind.

Now he knows he has that edge going into the fight.

He may feel like he cant go in there without it.

Not fighting Chael in short notice is not a big deal. He's the champion and he knows they cant strip him for not defending it against a short notice opponent.

He's definitley a jeckyll/hyde person though and thats only exacerbated by the substance abuse. That side is in him even without the drugs, but he loses control over it because of the drugs. The real him comes out.

But even a normal sober interview with him, you can tell that he's just trying to sell you an image of himself that isnt true.

 

[Bobby Boulders]

I may understand what you are trying to get at, but there is no way some one only making moves to protect their ego fights Shogun Hua, Rampage Jackson, Lyoto Machida, Rashad Evans, and Vitor Belfort, all UFC Champions, all MMA elite, all within 1.5 years at 23-24 years old.

Jon Jones admittedly has self esteem/confidence issues but he fears no one but himself as that is the only person that can defeat him. Well, also maybe some of those child raping priests up in the Northeast.

Mental hangups don't have to be ailments that were always and forever. I'd wager that, once he got to the top, that is when his mentality changed. He likely enjoyed the taste of success, and was willing to do whatever was necessary to maintain it. I don't think he was on PEDs early in his career, the dude was a string bean. I imagine that came later, bc he felt pressure to maintain what he'd gained. And that seems to be what he doing now.

 

[Clark Rogers]

The irony here is when those other examples all took risks, fought too late into their career, etc, and it blew up in their face there were threads upon threads claiming "fighter A should have protected their legacy and retired before fighting fighter B"

I get why people don't care for Jones given his history with substance, legal history, etc. But, the way the goal posts get moved with him is insane.

Just like the Gane fight, and i keep saying it. Coming into that fight there were literally daily "Gane via sitting he wants" threads, and plenty of posters claiming his fancy footwork and abs were going to firmly make him the future HW GOAT. Then he shits the bed against Jones while literally looking star struck, and that's when he became a joke unworthy of fighting for the belt.

There is literally no way to win in that situation. Those haters will always find some other reason to discredit anything that happens.

 

[Marko Polo]

All bad behavior, certainly

But he is also arguably the greatest cage fighter in history. A mentally weak person is not capable of that level of accomplishment IMO.

He’s an athlete who cheated. He won the majority of his fights using his insane range and eye pokes. He’s a good fighter, but he’s not the best fighter we’ve ever seen, and to say that is an insult to mankind

 

[burningspear]

None of the things you mentioned has anything to do with mental toughness.

Jon Jones parties because he is a drug addict. Has nothing to do with a safety net, I never even heard of that excuse before.

And also the Chael Sonnen criticism is one of the strangest Jon Jones criticisms that keeps being brought up. Countless championship fighters have refused taking fights on short notice. Didn't Alex Peiriera literally just do that after previously accepting short notice fights? Is he mentally weak too?

Like the impression is that Jon Jones ducked Chael Sonnen. Am I in bizzaro world or didn't they fight, and he beat his ass? Why would fighting him on short notice be indicative of anything other than he wasn't ready to fight him on short notice?

He definitely said it was a safety crutch but not fighting the overmatched sonnen was a fuck sonnen moment not a duck imo.

 

[GluttonforPunishment]

It's so hard keeping up with the Sherdog narrative on Jon. He goes from uncaring psychopath to insecure pussy and back again.

We have reached the Jones was never good bullshit in this bowl of turds.

 

[JKS]

By no means is Jon mentally weak, he's one of the strongest fighters mentally ever. But he is clearly afraid to take the Aspinal fight. And that's not mentally weak, that logical thinking in him seeing a fighter who stands a great chance to beat him and hit his legacy.

 

[rearnakedchoke]

Of course. He didn’t think he was good enough to beat his foes without peds.

 

[josh345]

Both sides make good points in this thread

 

[L0ki]

He roided every time he was scheduled to fight DC.

Dunno what you want to call it but he took a big shortcut to ensure he won.