We’ve all spent considerable time during Jon Jones‘ six-and-a-half-year run in the UFC trying to figure out if he is the man he portrays himself as.
In the wake of news this week, via Steven Marrocco of MMAJunkie.com, that the fight company’s brilliant but often perplexing light heavyweight champion checked into a drug rehabilitation clinic after failing a Nevada State Athletic Commission test for the primarily metabolite for cocaine, perhaps we can finally agree to meet in the middle.
Jones, it seems, is just a man with as much capacity for weakness as greatness.
As the announcement floated across our social media time lines on Tuesday afternoon, it was met with equal parts surprise and studied indifference. As all things involving Jones, there were a lot of bad jokes to be cracked.
Lumped in with the most shocking aspects of the story was that it broke just days after Jones turned in another stunningly complete performance in the Octagon, defeating Daniel Cormier at UFC 182 via unanimous decision, as well as the date of his failed test—Dec. 4, just a month or so before that bout—and the reality the NSAC would let him fight knowing he’d flunked it.
Among the very least surprising was the well-worn saw about a wealthy professional athlete dabbling in recreational drugs. It also didn’t likely shatter many MMA fans’ visions of Jones to suddenly learn he might have a substance-abuse problem, especially considering his well-documented previous trouble with alcohol.
Deadspin’s Greg Howard, who penned a lengthy profile of the fighter last week, noted Tuesday that gossip about Jones’ drug habit swirled while he was in New Mexico researching his initial article:
This doesn’t come out of nowhere. In reporting this story, I heard a lot of rumors about Jones’s cocaine use, some of which went past what you’d expect of a rich young celebrity in 2014. I left those alone partly because it’s a long way from rumor to solid fact and partly because, as evidenced by his success, whatever he’s been up to late at night hasn’t hurt his athletic performance much.
Indeed, to know Jones used illicit drugs during the final weeks leading up to his grudge match against Cormier is unsettling. To think he did it in what should have been the heart of his training camp and still showed up looking better than ever, dominated the former Olympic wrestler and handed him the first loss of his professional MMA career?
That boggles the mind.
It’s the sort of jarring little factoid that makes you feel you don’t have a clue about what’s really going on in this sport or about the men and women who make it breathe.
We were told this camp had been intense and fruitful for Jones. The fight itself was steeped in bad blood and figured all along to be very competitive. To have success against Cormier, it didn’t seem as though he could afford any distractions, and we heard he was done underestimating his opponents after a close call against Alexander Gustafsson at UFC 165.
During fight week, he appeared relaxed and confident. If there were any hints of demons plaguing him, perhaps they were cloaked in comments that he’d just moved his family full-time to Albuquerque, New Mexico, was changing his lifestyle and intended to start training year-round, as he told Fox Sports 1 after beating Cormier, via Sherdog’s Tristen Critchfield:
I already told my coaches, ‘Don’t expect any BS from me. I’ll be back in practice as soon as my face heals, probably within a week. … That’s something I’ve been missing. I wasted a lot of time. I get fat in between camps. I do a lot of things that are immature.
Even if there was a secret lurking in those quotes, there were no overt hints that two days after making them, he’d check himself into rehab.
Additional stuff to file under surprising/not-that-surprising: It’s unclear as yet if Jones will suffer any further punishment related to his drug use. NSAC chair Bill Bennett told the Los Angeles Times‘ Lance Pugmire that the commission could still penalize the fighter in the future, but statements released the same day by the UFC made it seem as though Jones’ employer will not.
The fighter himself also released a prepared statement, apologizing to his family, fans, coaches and the UFC.
“I am taking this treatment program very seriously,” Jones said. “Therefore, at this time, my family and I would appreciate privacy.”
Cormier said a few words, as did Reebok, the UFC’s new apparel partner, announcing the status of its recently unveiled sponsorship deal with Jones has not changed.
And so, we’re left to assume that if Jones can get his personal life in order, his professional march toward one day being recognized as the greatest mixed martial artist of all time will go on unabated. That alone likely rankles many people—some of them his peers—who’ve already publicly lashed out.
In the immediate aftermath, we were left wondering exactly how to feel. As serious as this latest revelation is—certainly the most worrying of the champion’s many personal transgressions—it really only adds another layer to Jones’ already enigmatic and occasionally churlish reputation.
We’ve been watching him do amazing things inside the cage for more than half a decade now, yet we still have very little idea what he’s capable of from one moment to the next.
The more we learn, however, the more we must come to grips with the notion that he’s just a human. He’s talented and flawed, reasonable and unreasonable, just as deserving of our scorn and pity as our respect and admiration.
Sound like anybody else we know?
No. It sounds like everybody else we know.
Read more MMA news on BleacherReport.com