10 Times Jon Jones Screwed The Pooch

Jon Jones is undoubtedly one of the best fighters ever to set foot in the Octagon, but unfortunately he has also become one of the most controversial too.

In the early days of his UFC career Jones aspired to be one of the ‘good guys’ in the sport, claiming that he wanted to be a role model for the next generation.

However, despite appearing to have the world at his feet, the cracks soon began to show in his personal life, and it became clear that behind the scenes, ‘Bones’ was just as troubled as he was talented.

In this article we’ll look at 10 of the most controversial moments in the former light heavyweight champion’s career to date, which help paint a picture of how he became one of the sport’s most notorious villains.

10. Car Towed At Strip Club In Albuquerque

Jones has a long history of auto-related incidents, including having his car towed by police in November of 2011, a little over two weeks before his title fight with Lyoto Machida at UFC 140.

According to the official report, a police officer spotted Jones coming around a corner sideways with his tires squealing, then continuing at a high rate of speed before pulling into the parking lot of ‘Fantasy World’, Albuquerque’s only fully nude strip club.

During the traffic stop that followed, the officer discovered that Jones was also driving while his license was suspended.

While this wasn’t Jones’ most serious brush with the law, it was an early indication that he wasn’t as squeaky clean as he was pretending to be.

9. Eye Pokes

Jones didn’t appear to be intentionally breaking the rules with his downward elbows against Matt Hamill back in 2009, which resulted in another controversial moment in his career when the referee opted to disqualify him – which is to this day still the only loss of his illustrious career.

However, the question of whether Jones has intentionally eye poked several of his opponents in the UFC has become the subject of heated debate, with a significant number of his opponents, including Alexander Gustafsson, Daniel Cormier, Mauricio ‘Shogun’ Rua, Quinton ‘Rampage’ Jackson and Rashad Evans appearing to have experienced it.

In fact, it’s happened so many times over the years that Jones himself has had to acknowledge that it is an issue, but he’s denied that there’s any malice or intent behind the illegal move.

“””I don’t believe it’s dirty,” Jones told Ariel Helwani in 2014 after Glover Teixeira became the latest in a long line of title contenders to be poked in the eye. “It’s something that I do instinctually, it’s something that I need to work on. It’s just something that happens.”

However, Jones also controversially posted (and then soon after deleted) an Instagram video at the time in which he mocked fans who were calling him out for his eye poking antics, which suggested that he wasn’t really taking the matter seriously.

Despite having acknowledged that he needed to stop doing it, Jones soon went back to his old habits, eye poking Daniel Cormier in their title fight at UFC 192 in early 2015.

8. Snitching On Marijuana Users

Early in his UFC career, while trying to cultivate a squeaky clean image, Jones put his foot in it by claiming that in his youth he used to snitch on his peers.

“I’ve always been a person who tries to do the right thing in life, for the most part,” Jones told Sherdog.com in 2009. “I’m no angel, but I was always the kid who snitched on the kids who had pot.”

His comments didn’t go do well and as his career continued, Jones would be accused of faking his ‘good guy’ image.

Fast forward to the present day and it’s hard to argue with that assessment when you consider that Jones has since confessed that not only has he used marijuana (as well as other drugs), but he was actually addicted to it at one stage!

7. Homophobic Remarks On Social Media

Jones has acted erratically on social media numerous times, and it almost landed him in hot water back in 2014 when he made homophobic remarks towards a fan.

During the course of an argument with a Swedish fan of his rival, Alexander Gustafsson on Instagram, Jones insinuated that the man was gay, calling him a “f*g” numerous times and also stated that, “Homosexuality is a sin.”

The remarks were in violation of the UFC’s own Code Of Conduct, and other fighters had been punished in the past for similar remarks, but he managed to work his way out of trouble by denying he had made the posts.

Jones and his management team would make several excuses in the aftermath of the posts, claiming that he’d been hacked, that his phone had been stolen, and then finally settling on it having been an overzealous member of his social media team who had written the messages and since been fired.

6. DUI Charge After Crashing Car In NYC

Jon Jones best efforts to portray a clean-cut image were dealt a blow in May of 2012 when he crashed his Bentley Continental GT into a pole late at night in upstate New York.

Jones, who had two female passengers in the car with him at the time (neither of which was his fiancee), was slurring his words and unsteady on his feet when police arrived at the scene, which led to him being arrested on a DUI charge.

Jones’ license was suspended for six months and fined $1,000 in addition to being ordered to attend alcohol awareness classes.

5. Refusal To Fight Chael Sonnen On Short Notice

Jones was scheduled to fight Dan Henderson at UFC 151 on September 1 2012, but when his opponent pulled out injured on short notice it left the promotion with a dilemma as they frantically searched for a suitable replacement.

Luckily, Chael Sonnen came to the rescue and agreed to step in, but with barely a week to go until the event, Jones flat-out refused to fight him.

As a direct result of Jones’ decision the UFC had to cancel the event entirely for the first time in their history.

Dana White was furious at Jones, and it’s not hard to see why as the cancellation is believed to have cost the UFC over million, as well as also having left the other fighters on the card without a much-needed payday.

4. Drag Racing / Swearing At Cop

Jones’ most recent run-in with the law happened within the last fortnight, having been cited for five different driving offences in Albuquerque, including drag racing, exhibition driving, weaving, failing to properly display a license plate and modifying his exhaust pipe.

Jones was already on probation for another driving-related incident a year prior, and had also been cited earlier in the month for driving without his license, insurance and registration.

With that in mind you would think that Jones would have been on his best behaviour, but instead he started arguing with the officer, who was recording the incident on his body cam, calling him “a f*cking liar” and “a pig”.

Jones was arrested days later for violating the terms of his probation and spent a few days behind bars, but was then released after further conditions were added to his probation, including 60 hours of community service, and requirements to attend driver education and anger management courses.

3. Testing Positive For Cocaine

Just days after successfully defending his title against Daniel Cormier at UFC 192 in January of 2015, it emerged that Jones had tested positive for cocaine a month earlier.

Luckily for Jones, the discovery had been made during an out-of-competition test, which didn’t include cocaine as a banned substance, so the discovery hadn’t prevented him from fighting.

Jones agreed to go into rehab after the story broke, but only spent 24 hours at the drug treatment facility. He was, however, fined $25,000 for breaking the UFC’s own code of conduct.

’Bones’ would later reveal that he’d taken the drug at a party, and also admitted that he’d used cocaine a few times before in the past, but claimed that he didn’t have a habit and had only ever been addicted to marijuana.

2. Pre-Fight Brawl With Daniel Cormier

In August of 2014, Jones was involved in the most chaotic press conference in UFC history at the lobby of the MGM Grand Hotel in Las Vegas, when a staredown with Daniel Cormier suddenly erupted into an all-out brawl between the two stars.

Cormier was furious when Jones appeared to clash heads with him during the photo-op, and angrily shoved him away. Jones rushed straight back at him throwing punches, which resulted in Cormier falling off the back of the stage.

Jones continued trying to hit his grounded rival until security staff finally managed to pull them apart. Jones then went back on stage and started flexing and shouting in triumph in front of the assembled media and fans.

The controversy continued later that day when Jones and Cormier went on ESPN to publicly apologize for the brawl, only for Jones to then be recorded off-air calling his rival a “p*ssy” and threatening to kill him.

The two fighters were fined 10% of their fight purse as a result of the brawl.

1. Hit-And-Run Incident

As we’ve seen by now, Jones is no stranger to trouble, but arguably his other most controversial moments pale in comparison to his lowest moment in April of 2015, when he fled the scene of an accident he’d caused that left a pregnant woman with a broken arm.

Jones had crashed his rental SUV into the back of a woman’s car after running a red light in Albuquerque, New Mexico. To make matters worse he was spotted running away, then coming back to pick up some money from his vehicle, and then fleeing the scene again.

When officers arrived at the scene they discovered documents proving it was Jones who was driving, in addition to also finding a marijuana pipe and condoms.

Jones turned himself into the police a day later, and the UFC quickly suspended the fighter and stripped him of his light-heavyweight title.

Several months later Jones pled guilty to fleeing the scene of a hit-and-run accident, and was handed 18 months probation, while also being required to attend 72 appearances doing charity work and talking with kids.