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UFC 152: Why Vitor Belfort Instead of Chael Sonnen?

Jon Jones doesn’t want to fight Chael Sonnen on eight days notice. For that reason, he refused a fight with the former middleweight at UFC 151, and that decision ultimately led to the card’s demise.When Bones was moved to UFC 152, Lyoto Machida was nam…

When Bones was moved to UFC 152, Lyoto Machida was named as the replacement for an injured Dan Henderson, but The Dragon mysteriously turned down the championship opportunity.

With Machida out of the picture, Jones still needed an opponent for Sept. 22. Clearly, the best candidate for the position is middleweight contender Vitor Belfort. Wait. What?

If the short notice was the true reason that Jones wouldn’t face Sonnen at UFC 151, why isn’t the champion facing Oregon’s favorite wrestler at UFC 152?

Only hours ago, the announcement was made that Jon Jones will defend his championship against The Phenom in the new main event of UFC 152.

No one seems to understand why or how Belfort appeared in the picture. After all, Chael Sonnen has been engaged in a Twitter war with the champion. He looked like a hero on Thursday when he offered to save an endangered event.

In terms of marketability, it is a no-brainer that Sonnen is a better selection than Belfort. Fans are certainly willing to pay for Chael in a championship bout. In fact, his UFC 148 rematch with Anderson Silva is one of the rare events to break 1,000,000 buys on pay-per-view.

How about rankings? Neither Belfort nor Sonnen has been a light-heavyweight in recent history, so both men are outside of the divisional top 10. While Sonnen doesn’t get the advantage here, he isn’t hurt either.

Ultimately, I feel that the decision came down to the fact that Chael Sonnen is coming off of a loss. While Belfort’s latest bouts are victories over non-ranked opponents like Yoshihiro Akiyama and Anthony Johnson, he has momentum on his side.

Sonnen, Belfort or someone else: Who do you think should face Jon Jones next month?

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Despite What Jackson Says, Jones Not Taking the Sonnen Fight Is Unprofessional

Jon Jones should be the ultimate team player. In fact, walking cageside with the UFC logo emblazoned across his chest, Jones is currently the only fighter being paid sponsorship dollars by world’s largest combat organization, yet, when the thankless la…

Chael Sonnen has been the No. 2 ranked middleweight in the world for most of the last 30 months. Twice unsuccessful in dethroning Anderson Silva, the American Gangster decided that a move to light-heavyweight would be in the best interest of his career.

Sonnen was scheduled for a bout at UFC 155 against Forrest Griffin, but was quick to jump at an opportunity to replace fellow Team Quest fighter Dan Henderson.

In selecting a replacement, Dana White settled on a marketable star who is both dangerous and relevant. Not only that, but Sonnen has recently been engaged in a Twitter war with “Bones.” The marketing strategy would be simple, and the possibility of a strong PPV buyrate was still realistic.

Regardless of how you feel about the situation, the actions of Jones are undeniably selfish. Fighters are paid to fight. Champions are paid to defend their titles. At what point does a champion get to pick and choose his opponents? Once Jon Jones agreed to step into the Octagon on September 1st, it is up to the matchmakers to determine who stands in front of him.

In an interview with MMAweekly.com, coach Greg Jackson responded to the heavy criticism that White fired in the direction of him and the biggest star in his camp.

“Chael is in a great position in that he’d been training with Dan Henderson for this fight, getting him ready, and he’s in shape. He knows the plan on what they’re gonna do to get around Jon. So he’s ready to go…

…It’s not like he’s stepping off the couch and into a fight. So taking a fight of that caliber with a guy that’s ready, on three days notice, for a world championship, without any time to prepare, is just not professional to me.”

If the biggest concern that Jones has is that his opponent is in shape, there should be no issue here. Supposedly, Bones is the third best pound-for-pound fighter on the planet. The physical tools possessed by the champion should be enough to combat anything or anyone thrown in his direction. He has excellent wrestling, which should neutralize the takedown attempts of Sonnen.

No champion should ever turn down a fight because it is too dangerous. It’s cowardly and goes against the spirit of calling yourself the best in the world.

Jon Jones should be scared to lose his belt. Any champion who claims that he doesn’t dread the idea of losing his belt is a liar. While fear is understandable, it doesn’t give him the right to play matchmaker. His actions were unprofessional and downright disgusting.

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UFC 152 Jones vs. Belfort: Has the Light Heavyweight Division Lost Its Luster?

Once possibly the deepest division in the UFC, the light heavyweight division is now but a puddle. The fact that the UFC is flying in middleweight Vitor Belfort to fight Jon Jones attests to this. Yes. I know. Mauricio “Shogun” Rua, Lyoto…

Once possibly the deepest division in the UFC, the light heavyweight division is now but a puddle.

The fact that the UFC is flying in middleweight Vitor Belfort to fight Jon Jones attests to this.

Yes. I know.

Mauricio “Shogun” Rua, Lyoto Machida, Rashad Evans, Quinton “Rampage” Jackson and Ryan Bader are all good fighters. The fact that Jones beat all of them within a year did not magically make them bad.

Jones’ feverish pace, indeed, is the main reason the UFC found itself in such an awkward position with finding light heavyweight contenders. Even if Henderson did not get injured, the promotion faced a tough sell when it came to convincing fans to buy into Lyoto Machida’s chances against Jones, who beat him with a shocking standing guillotine choke at UFC 140.

All that aside, the UFC light heavyweight division is in dire straits, and there is no end in sight. Most of the division’s modern mainstays are close to retirement.

Rua looked nothing like the soccer-kicking demon he was in Pride when he struggled to deal with a slow, clunky Brandon Vera. Dan Henderson is over 40 years old, and there is no getting around that fact. “Rampage” Jackson is downright aching to leave the UFC. Forrest Griffin had Dana White wishing he would call it a career a matter of weeks ago.

Tito Ortiz is gone. Randy Couture is gone. Chuck Liddell is gone. Stephan Bonnar is going. Matt Hamill is just coming back. Rich Franklin and Wanderlei Silva are in the middleweight division. Keith Jardine and Houston Alexander were exposed and then cut from the promotion.

Gloomy, no?

It gets worse. There are glaring problems with the current crop of “prospects” that are supposed to become the future of the division.

Ryan Bader getting downright demolished by Lyoto Machida shows that he has hit his ceiling. Phil Davis has shown little but solid wrestling in his UFC career to this point. Glover Teixeira, though his limits remain unknown, is 32 years old and is likely as good as he will ever be (but, to reiterate, how good he is remains to be seen).

The division, right now, has just one true championship-caliber prospect in Alexander Gustafsson. Though brimming with potential, he is at least two more wins away from truly entering the title picture.

Then, to top everything else off, two of the last remaining light heavyweight contenders, Evans and Machida, are potentially moving down to middleweight.

Yes, Chael Sonnen is joining the division. That, though exciting and likely to generate a championship bout, is simply not enough to mask the fact that the light heavyweight division will be almost empty in the next year or two.

So now, here we are. All these things have fallen into place, such that UFC 152 is going to be topped with Vitor Belfort fighting outside his native weight class. Belfort has been on the outside looking in on the middleweight title picture for a long while. Now, though, he is going to face Jon Jones because, simply, they had no other choice.

With that, it is hard to deny that what was the most intriguing division in the UFC now has very little to be excited about.

There are no title contenders. There are almost no prospects. There are no rivalries that have not already been played out.

So has the light heavyweight division lost its luster? Yes. Now, it is just more obvious than ever.

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UFC 151 Cancelled: Jon Jones Either Re-Branding Brilliantly or Failing Miserably

The UFC has a star problem.You can recruit the best talent, cultivate that talent and market the hell out of the finished product, but every fighter is a split-second lapse from being stopped and falling to the back of the line. Remember the Broc…

The UFC has a star problem.

You can recruit the best talent, cultivate that talent and market the hell out of the finished product, but every fighter is a split-second lapse from being stopped and falling to the back of the line.

Remember the Brock Lesnar era? Or the Cain Velasquez era? Or the Lyoto Machida era?

Jon Jones has the tools to be part of the solution, but his refusal to fight Chael Sonnen on short notice seemingly made him part of the problem. The UFC can endure losses from their big names, but for a company with fighting in its title, it’s difficult to calculate the impact of its rising star refusing to fight.

Jones was not obligated to accept the fight with Sonnen. It is his right to turn down a short-notice title defense and train for the next highest-ranked challenger. Any fighter has the right of refusal, but Jon Jones isn’t just any fighter.

He’s the potential star who can elevate the sport further into the mainstream; he’s the lone MMA fighter with a Nike endorsement.

Rather than save UFC 151 by taking on a 35-year-old with less than two weeks to prepare, he chose to protect his title rather than defend it. Fear may not have been the motivating factor, but in the alpha-dog world of MMA, the mere appearance of fear can be enough to condemn.

And mainstream fans typically don’t pay to watched a coward.

But they’ll pay to watch a villain.

Jones has been unapologetic for acknowledging pay-per-view projections in his desire to select opponents. He speaks freely about business savvy and defends his motives as a refusal to be a “broke athlete” when he retires. There are few things in professional sports less endearing than millionaire athletes voicing their financial motives.

On a conference call with the media, UFC President Dana White laid into Jones and his coaches and wasn’t shy about touching on the money issue (via MMAFighting.com):

Good for you, Jon Jones. You’re rich, and you got some money; you don’t need to take this fight. But there’s a bunch of guys on the undercard. This is how they feed their family, and this is how they make a living.

White also said Jones’ popularity has yet to match his talent and success, for whatever reason, and the refusal to fight Chael Sonnen probably wouldn’t help:

As much as he’s won, and all the things he’s accomplished in a short amount of time, he burst onto the scene a year and a half ago, he’s ripped through the top guys, he’s been a champion that hasn’t been very popular and I don’t think this is going to do wonders for his popularity.

Popularity can be overrated. Polarizing sells.

The Yankees, LeBron, Tiger and Floyd Mayweather move the needle and sell tickets everywhere they go. They are loved by some, hated by many. The worst thing for a relatively niche sport like MMA is to run guys out that don’t induce emotional responses.

Jon Jones is stirring up emotions. It remains to be seen whether he’s doing it intentionally or if he’s just a coward.

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Rousey, Fedor and the 10 Most Overhyped Fighters Ever

Hype is a funny thing. It can hurt you. It can help you. It can build you up at breakneck speeds only to tear you down when it sees fit. It’s wild. It’s unpredictable.Sometimes it arrives precisely when you think it will, and sometimes it sidles up on …

Hype is a funny thing. It can hurt you. It can help you. It can build you up at breakneck speeds only to tear you down when it sees fit. It’s wild. It’s unpredictable.

Sometimes it arrives precisely when you think it will, and sometimes it sidles up on you and smiles. Some ask for it, others don’t. But no matter how you slice it, hype is what sustains a fighter.

This list consists of the 10 fighters who have suffered through a spectacular whirlwind of hype. A few were consumed by it, others thrived, and some’s fates are still at its whimsy. Here is hype’s most wanted list.

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Rousey, Fedor and the 10 Most Overhyped Fighters Ever

Hype is a funny thing. It can hurt you. It can help you. It can build you up at breakneck speeds only to tear you down when it sees fit. It’s wild. It’s unpredictable.

Sometimes it arrives precisely when you think it will, and sometimes it sidles up on you and smiles. Some ask for it, others don’t. But no matter how you slice it, hype is what sustains a fighter.

Begin Slideshow