Why hasn't jon jones improved his boxing?

[AnotherOldGuy]

This is not to bash jon jones but a serious question. We have all these wrestlers that have come into mma without a striking base that have come and do well.

While some don't have a complete striking game, they have enough, Woodley, Chandler, gaethje, Usman, DC, cejudo and so many others.

It seems like jon despite being more seasoned has no hands. Is it a coach thing? Is it just something he's never going to be good at? Maybe someone who train striking, can you share ?

It's be cool to see jon piece someone up with combinations.

Only so many hours in a week to train. Spending more time on striking means spending less time on something else. I suspect he and his coaches do their assessment on what his best path to victory is, and then concentrates on that, fixing holes and maintaining things that are working (specific skills and abilities, even ones you're very good at, decay if not practiced).

Its no different than asking why an NFL team doesn't say run the ball more -- usually its because they don't think its their best path to the Superbowl (ie their team lacks ability for the running game, and building up that ability means sacrificing the pass game that's already working for them).

 

[Tweak896]

Why box when your eyepokes... I mean fingers out distance measuring negates most boxing? Not trying to hate on Jones, but even the threat of his fingers in the opponents face makes them hesitant. Also mma rules hardly penalize eye pokes so Jones is basically maximizing his chances.

 

[TerrorTimmy]

Because steroids don't teach you boxing, training boxing teaches you boxing, and he doesn't do that

 

[markg171]

Because he's the best kickboxer, and just beats them with the additional limbs.

 

[TheComputerGuy]

If you are allowed to roid you don't need to train.

 

[Blayt7hh]

This is just nitpicking. Few hate Jones more than I do, but his striking is brilliant.
Would I like it better if he cut range and threw monster hooks? Yes, but he understands range like no other.

This is it, and it shows who understands fighting on these threads. His boxing is probably decent enough but we don’t see it because his body and his toolbox have more effective options for him. It’s not as if it never occurred to Jon to study more boxing

 

[Maripucci]

He didn't really need to at LHW because of his reach advantage but at HW it will be interesting to see if he develops it more since his reach advantage won't be as much.

 

[BBMN]

Doesn't seem to be as effective now that he's exciting his prime. In his prime that teep kick whipped fast. I watched some of his old fights and couldn't believe how fast he got off those kicks. Almost forgot.

He threw a front snapping kick at Hamill's face early in their fight, and it is one of the most shockingly fast strikes I've ever seen thrown by a 205lb man. Matt barely dodged his head out of the way and his eyes looked confused at how fast it was.

 

[Peli]

This is just nitpicking. Few hate Jones more than I do, but his striking is brilliant.
Would I like it better if he cut range and threw monster hooks? Yes, but he understands range like no other.

It's not nitpicking. It's genuine curiosity

 

[The-AxeMurderer]

I guess he prefers kicking at distance cause it's less likely he will get caught with a punch.

 

[Peli]

The better question is, does he need to improve his boxing?

We will see at hw. In his prime, his kicks were lighting quick. He's not getting them off the se way he did in his 20s the way he's does in 33. He's become more hittable as of late. So it might help. Or he could just be a kicking machine at be and picked up where he left off in his prime

 

[Misanthropist]

Why learn to box when you’re undefeated, has dominated for 10 years and got an iron chin?

Unless someone get inside him without eating elbows/knee stomps and KO him out, i don’t see that happening.

 

[alex21cms]

he s a muay thai kicker

 

[ifindgifsforjackslack]

Here’s my best broscience take, I have my bachelors. Longer Body means longer nerves which increases delay between the brain and the limbs. The reason we see Jon throw a lot more kicks and spinning elbows is because the first part of the body that moves for these techniques is the core. So his long and slow limbs have more time to catch up therefore almost being a flowing technique and not some Lanklet shit

 

[Azrael40]

In Jon Jones early fights he used his boxing well, and hurt people on the feet with punches. But later when he started fighting the better fighters in the division he stopped boxing because he was afraid of getting knocked out. You can really see it in the first Gus fight where Gus can lean out and tag Jones clean when Jones is trying to throw his kicks.

Thiago Santos, and Dominick Reyes both hurt Jon with their boxing when they exploded on Jon and he couldn't post his arm out and circle away.

 

[AnotherOldGuy]

Here’s my best broscience take, I have my bachelors. Longer Body means longer nerves which increases delay between the brain and the limbs. The reason we see Jon throw a lot more kicks and spinning elbows is because the first part of the body that moves for these techniques is the core. So his long and slow limbs have more time to catch up therefore almost being a flowing technique and not some Lanklet shit

Interesting take. I'm not a neurologist, so I may well be mistaken, but I've read that nervous signals to the legs and arms travel about about 100 meters/sec. That means the extra 20 cm of arm he has (reach is finger-tip to finger-tip or double the distance the signal has to go) takes about .002 seconds, which is insignificant.

And that's assuming the signal had to go to the end of the reach, which I doubt is true, given that the muscles activated are all pretty close to the core for punches too. That would mean the distance will be less than 20 cm (his core length is not 20 cm longer than most of his opponents). I suspect the length of the nerve path is insignificant compared to the reaction time (either in the brain for untrained movement, or just in the spinal cord for trained or instinctive movement (equivalent to putting your hand on a hot stove, where apparently the message is quickly processed at the spinal chord rather before going to the brain for slower but more in depth processing).

I may well be wrong, but that seems to fit what a quick Google brings up.

As well, having longer reach is generally (but not always) considered an advantage in boxing, so there's a fair amount of experimental evidence that longer reach is anything but a disadvantage in punching.

 

[DennisHallmansSpeedo]

why improve boxing when he can just do more steroids and coke?

 

[Willy Knuckles]

Ppl with super long reaches dont tend to have the best jobs. Even in boxing the Lennox and Hearns are outliers

as for the thread Jackson/Wink fighters arent fundamentally sound. They really on creativity, output and unpredictability mostly.

No one on their roster really has gureat boxing. Even Holms success standing in MMA has been in the clinch, wrestling and her kicking.

What boxers with long reach don't have good jabs? Longer reach directly correlates to a more effective jab

 

[Takes_Two_To_Tango]

I don't think his body can ever adapt to being a very good boxer. His body is just awkward and weird. Especially when he throws punches. He's just born not be able to advance his boxing to a high degree.

 

[kneesus]

His striking was brilliant. Years back Jon was creative, dynamic and versatile with his strikes. Nowadays there’s been a noticeable drop off in that. He also fights extremely cautiously now.

I think we can all assume why the drop off has happened...but Jon isn’t that same dynamic creative striker he once was.

I honestly think he just trained the creativity away and can't recover that organic style.