Immediately following his destruction of Mauricio “Shogun” Rua at UFC 128, newly crowned UFC light heavyweight champion Jon Jones stood face-to-face with the man he was set to meet in his first title defense, former friend and training partner Rashad Evans.
Alas, that fight was scrapped when Jones revealed a hand injury in late April. From Authentic Sports Management press release:
“This is an injury that’s been recurring since I was a college wrestler, it doesn’t affect my punching or grappling, but I am taking the time and the proper measures to correct this now, so that it doesn’t happen again. I look forward to getting back to training and to my first title defense. As for Rashad, let’s see what happens with Phil Davis. I will be watching that fight with great interest.”
Davis was moved in to Jones’ spot and he and Evans will meet at UFC 133, which will take place in Philadelphia on Aug. 6.
Jones had been scheduled to have surgery to correct his hand injury, but after meeting with the surgeon on May 13, Jones’ manager, Malki Kawa, announced via twitter, “We went to meet with the surgeon on wed and after he looked at @Jonnybones he thought that surgery was a bit evasive and bones didn’t have (to have the surgery)”
Jones recently spoke to MMACanada.net about the decision to forgo the surgery, “The way the doctor explained it to me, he would actually be doing me a disservice to cut me open, drills holes in my bones and file my bones down. He said, ‘considering you’re an athlete, surgery may not be the best thing for you.’ He put me through a lot of tests and he thought that I could live without the surgery and let it heal.”
As far as the fight against his former friend and training partner, “For all the people panicking at home, me and Rashad Evans are going to fight,” Jones said. “We both have a lot of fights left on our contracts, be patient guys, be patient.”
Jones is expecting to return to the Octagon in 2011. The champion said that his possible opponents would be the winner of the Evans versus Phil Davis fight, or possibly Lyoto Machida or Quinton “Rampage” Jackson.
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