@Luffy taking people to school here, Jones won. It was closer than most of his fights but he still won.
This. The typical users arguments are "fan girl", "JJ fan obsessed"... I've laid out my points quite clear enough that should put the narrative of "this win was controversial" to rest. Controversial would be if Paulo Costa had defeated Sean Strickland. Or if Sean Strickland won vs DDP 2 by SD... Or if Thiago Santos had won a SD vs Ankalaev. Heck, Jan Blackowski vs Ankalaev being a draw is controversial too. To be controversial is to say the win is questionable to the point that people don't even consider that a legit win, that is, that "did he win?" ... If you can ask a did he really win, then that's controversial. It wasn't, it was a close fight, rounds 2 and 3 Reyes had more volume, that is, landed more strikes, but Jones kept his composure and his strikes visibly affected Reyes more.
It's the same as Pereira vs Ankalaev round 3. Alex Pereira was ahead in the strikes by 21-15... Basically, same number of additional strikes. But Ankalaev won because his strikes had visibly more impact, even if slightly. Like JJ here. Did Reyes land good strikes, like that flush clear uppercut? Yes. But how did JJ react? JJ barely took a step back, he kept his composure, didn't retreat, his legs didn't give up, he wasn't rocked. Meanwhile, JJ's jabs and hooks threw Reyes out of balance, made him circle outside... When JJ kicked his body, Reyes touched the fence and gave wooof grimace. Those are what impactful strikes mean, how each fighter reacts, not how clean they land. Reyes was slowing down, the oblique kicks was sapping his energy mid round 3, he was moving backwards precisely because Jon Jones strikes were taking a bigger toll. So much so that in round 4, Reyes was already on shaky legs. He was on survival mode in those lad 20 seconds with his legs wobbling. All that is effect of cumulative damage, meaning he wasn't taking JJ's strikes as well, JJ took Reyes' strikes but his toughness covered any good optics, unlike Reyes.
Again, number of significant strikes = volume. Volume alone doesn't win fights. Impact > volume, always. Round 3 was close enough in volume that the impact was clear to argue for JJ's round. Same as round 2. Reyes had more volume, but effective strikes aren't jabs while retreating, those are counted as significant in the stats but they don't reflect visuals under effectiveness since there was no visible impact... Impact > volume, rule #1. Within that, rounds 2 and 3 were swing rounds. Rounds 4 and 5 were clear for JJ both in volume and on impact. Round 1 was clear for Reyes.
When we have 2 rounds that are swing ones (again, don't show # of strikes landed, observe how the opponent reacted), 2 clear ones for Jones and 1 clear for Reyes... The standard rule is to split the close rounds to each fighter, as they are in the realm of "close, depends on how one sees it". Giving both to one fighter is not so reasonable... can happen specially when judging live, which is what one judge did... But the standard rule is to award each one for each fighter as they are arguable. In which case, we still get the score 2 judges agreed on and that is the most reasonable, official, non-controversial and fair and square
Jon Jones 48 - 47 Reyes
.... That's it. It was close. Ppl should say "Reyes got close, he and Gus were the one's that got the closest to beating JJ that we know of, but Jon Jones thrives in pressure and remained one step ahead". That's it. Not a "JJ didn't win that" —> this makes it a controversial thing when it was never controversial. It was close, but not to the point the wrong person won... The right call was always 48-47, fans expecting that to be one sided and being surprised, the media dog piling (which is real... I mean, how many times do they fuel this in comparison to other close fights? Just the fact we have many robberies for this fight alone is proof of a biased induced behaviour) and fans buying all that because they love to imagine a loss that never happened just so they can be more at peace fuels it. I'm just bringing facts that besides it being official, it was also not even controversial to the point people misremember it through highlights.