Jones could be our Ali

[BreadnButter]

Lol no.

 

[Viking Power]

I assume this thread was begun to debate not only his role as champion but to weigh his influence and popularity as well.

To your statement... I'm not knowledgeable of the sport, but was anyone a champion (either continuously or broken up into various reigns) for as long as Ali?

Joe Louis held the belt for 11 years and 8 months if I recall correctly. 25 successful title defenses too.

 

[Dbreiden83080]

Say what you want, but whether you loved or hated Ali, you fucking watched him fight.

You weren't asked to plunk down 60 bucks in 1964 to watch him fight Sonny Liston..

 

[thelittleman]

You think MW's are 215-225 lbs on fight night?

I thought Ali weighed between 210-215 lbs. in his prime(I could be wrong). I am positive that almost every LHW weighs more than that on fight night, and am confident that there are many MW's that weigh more than that(I could be wrong). How much did Chris Weidman and Anderson Silva each weigh on their fight nights???

My point to the original post was that every LHW weighs much more than 205. People like to say that Jon Jones has an unfair advantage with his size, but he makes the 205 weight limit. He isn't the first fighter to cut a lot of weight. Most current UFC LHW's weigh more than the HW's of Ali's era. How much did Forrest Griffin weigh... 230+???

 

[Viking Power]

I thought Ali weighed between 210-215 lbs. in his prime(I could be wrong). I am positive that almost every LHW weighs more than that on fight night, and am confident that there are many MW's that weigh more than that(I could be wrong). How much did Chris Weidman and Anderson Silva each weigh on their fight nights???

My point to the original post was that every LHW weighs much more than 205. People like to say that Jon Jones has an unfair advantage with his size, but he makes the 205 weight limit. He isn't the first fighter to cut a lot of weight. Most current UFC LHW's weigh more than the HW's of Ali's era. How much did Forrest Griffin weigh... 230+???

Ali did start out around 210 but by the 1970's he was 225 pretty consistently. I'm going off memory so I could be wrong as well. As far as MMA LHW's go I think you're right on. We've all heard that guys like Tito and Forrest were 230ish on fight night.

 

[CerebralKnievel]

To my ow opinion, Jones is nothing of interest. I haven't even watched him fight since Rampage. Hardly someone I would compare to an historical legend of a sport. Obviously, I'm in the minority of MMA fans on this issue, but as someone who has seen every UFC event dating back 10 years and the majority of other major promotions within that time, I think it goes without saying that the guy isn't all that amazing of a champion if a viewer as bought-in as myself has lost interest.

 

[dontsnitch]

You weren't asked to plunk down 60 bucks in 1964 to watch him fight Sonny Liston..

Lulz, I wasn't alive in '64, was it free on one of the 4 channels that were available?

 

[BIGPERG]

I don't understand why fans hate him so much and more importantly, why they want him to lose so much.. It's kinda similar to Mayweather in some regards.. If you look at the record he's built up, the records he's broken and the ones he could be on his way to breaking in the future, he could be on his way to being the greatest fighter of all time.

I root for him to win, not because I think he's a diamond bloke, he's not, he comes across petulant sometimes, arrogant sometimes and straight up obnoxious at others..but I believe if he carries on this path, and this sports does the same then in 50 years time we could be looking back the same way as my grandad did when he would talk about watching Ali in his prime.. Tomorrow night could be our Rumble in the Jungle

I hate Jon Jones because he beat all my favourite fighters, has a retardedly unfair reach advantage, uses it perfectly, and eye pokes every opponent on purpose. Yes on purpose, he knows what he's doing. That is all. 😄

 

[TeamSpaceMonkey]

Ali was funny. He was charismatic and clever. Jones is none of those things. Although, sometimes he's unintentionally funny.

 

[Dragin'Don]

I don't understand why fans hate him so much and more importantly, why they want him to lose so much.. It's kinda similar to Mayweather in some regards.. If you look at the record he's built up, the records he's broken and the ones he could be on his way to breaking in the future, he could be on his way to being the greatest fighter of all time.

I root for him to win, not because I think he's a diamond bloke, he's not, he comes across petulant sometimes, arrogant sometimes and straight up obnoxious at others..but I believe if he carries on this path, and this sports does the same then in 50 years time we could be looking back the same way as my grandad did when he would talk about watching Ali in his prime.. Tomorrow night could be our Rumble in the Jungle

You sir are correct only time will tell.. Except I root for DC ..For personal reasons I don't like some of the tactics Jon uses in the ring (eye pokes / Knee attacks ) He has was to much talent to need to use such dirty moves. Plus DC jus lost his daughter as a father I can feel for him

 

[private user]

Ali was one of the most polarizing and charismatic figures in the history of SPORTS, and his cultural significance and profile is probably 100 x greater than what Jones us right now

Charisma is what clearly separates the two

 

[Cocakillbana]

You don't understand why people hate him? Really?

Constantly pokes opponent eyes
Drives drunk and crashes car with people in it.
Says homophobic things on social media and blames it on being hacked everytime.
When the cameras are on he's a polite guy, but when they're off, or when he thinks they're off he's a total jerkoff.

And remember when he came into the UFC he had the image of a hall monitor? The kid who snitched on others for smoking weed. Get fast forward when he gets into hot water he cries "hacker."

Outside of the ring he reeks of a total fraud. That's why people hate him.

People hated Ali because he was smart, funny and a witty black guy. He was too over the top for the white public at that time. They didn't hate him because time and again he revealed himself to be a scummy person like Mr. Jones.

Jones has huge talent in the ring and is black. That's about where the similarities stop between him and Ali.

 

[DyinHawaiian]

Most of us see the beginning and end of Ali's career. The truth is, in Ali's prime, he was absolutely hated by a good majority of the people. People saw him as cocky and his mouth got him in trouble. He was this young kid basically who was beating all the legends at that time, and he did it in spectacular fashion. Others saw him as a "draft dodger." Some people hated him for his religious beliefs, and others hated him because he was young, black, and successful. I know people don't want to admit that middle one, but it's the truth. People wanted to see Ali lose and were extremely satisfied when Frazier beat him.

People don't want to admit that there are similarities to Ali and Jones, but there are some. Is Jones ever going to be as big as Ali in anything, probably not. But for the MMA landscape, it's not that bad of a comparison.

This.

 

[Dbreiden83080]

For those of you out there that actually know the history of Ali and I get the sense that is essentially zero of you he would be absolutely hated by a huge segment of the population today. This is a man that was running around with black supremacists. A man that once called Joe Frazier an uncle Tom and the white man's champion. Dodging the draft when your name was called, that netted him quite a few haters back in the day.