This past week of MMA news has not been kind to the fans of combat sports. Yesterday, the most anticipated fight of 2014 was lost when UFC light heavyweight champion Jon “Bones” Jones was injured during training, thus forcing the postponement of his scheduled UFC 178 title fight against No. 1 contender Daniel Cormier.
Reports from MMAFighting have stated that Jones suffered a torn left meniscus and sprained ankle. While surgery does not seem imminent for Jones, at this point in time the facts are too sparse to make any conclusive statements.
Today news surfaced that Jones’ injury occurred during practice with new teammate and UFC heavyweight Alistair Overeem. Jones’ head coach, Greg Jackson spoke with Sherdog and gave them the scoop on what happened:
It’s part of the game, it wasn’t like … somebody went for a flying kick and dislocated [something]. Somebody went for a takedown, [Jones] stepped the wrong way, twisted the wrong way and down he went. He was fighting it, and he just twisted it. And then it just popped. Alistair’s maybe 240, Jon’s 220. It’s not like he was working with a giant moose. It was just one of those things.
Is seems that the injury was simply a freak accident, as often happens in MMA, but it is unfortunate that Overeem is the culprit. If you recall, Overeem was involved in injuring another fellow UFC heavyweight, Guto Innocente during his time training with the Blackzilians down in South Florida.
Innocente’s knee injury caused conflict among the Blackzilian team which ultimately led Overeem to leave South Florida and begin training with Greg Jackson’s team down in Albuquerque.
The UFC tentatively scheduled the light heavyweight title bout between Jones and Cormier for January 3rd at UFC 182 in Las Vegas, Nevada. Hopefully Jones is fully healed by then, and fans will get the fight they have been waiting for.
