I think Stipe could still pose some problems for Jones, not giving him enough credit there TS.
Stipe
theoretically poses the same problems Gus originally did which was that he's a big boxer, good power, and good wrestling.
The question is whether Stipe can still do that. More importantly, though the rematch went extremely differently and dominantly for Jones so is that actually even an issue if he can.
Not sure if serious if you don't think stipe has been washed up for a while now. Even in his last win against DC he looked bad.
This is only because the fight went the distance instead of being a 2nd round KO for Stipe. In the 2nd Stipe slumped him again and tried to finish him but it was right near the bell so DC was able to tie him up from mounted and survive.
We'd be talking about things a lot differently if Stipe went from 4th round KOing DC in a hard fought fight to easily 2nd round KOing him. Still, he clearly won the decision regardless.
If we wanted to argue something about where Stipe looked bad it was his fight IQ in the Ngannou rematch. He got dropped like a sack, quickly tried to fight back and surprisingly briefly stunned Ngannou in his tracks, and then took that to try and finish Ngannou himself instead of get a breather. That got him KO'd.
1) Jon would not give this ADVANTAGE to DC (by fighting at HW). Very different than running from someone he beat a few times already. But he said (for a very long time) that he wanted to move up. Even before DC!
People are always so dishonest about this. The context was DC had already moved up to HW a year and a half ago and had 2 fights under his belt again, meanwhile Jones was still and had always been a LHW. DC did have an advantage over him by having adjusted up to HW while Jon was still a LHW. He was entirely correct to say that RIGHT NOW he didn't think it was in his interest to move up given DC currently had an advantage.
Anybody pretending like the current HW Jones, who already has successfully moved up to HW, wouldn't have fought that HW DC is being silly. The entire issue was about a LHW challenging a HW. He's a HW now and perfectly fine fighting other HWs now that there's no longer that difference. Just like he was at LHW.
Let alone the irony behind all of this is that the person actually ducking was DC. He was stripped of his LHW belt because he refused to defend against the returning Jones so the UFC had to make Jones/Gus II for a new title. Then the night before he was being stripped he pettily vacated the title so that history wouldn't officially record him of being stripped for failing to defend against Jones.
