Jon Jones is still learning on the job. Being a big star fighter and genuinely dumping on your opponent isn't easy. Quinton "Rampage" Jackson may not be the fighter he was in his twenties, but he's better than ever when it comes to delivering awesome lines to denigrate his opponent.
In a piece of marketing genius, the fighters appeared together on "The Jimmy Kimmel Show." Jackson stole the moment. That's not a rip on Jones, he's simply not seasoned enough and frankly, it's just not in his nature to trash talk in brash fashion.
Jones defends his UFC light heavyweight title belt against Jackson, a former 205-pound UFC champ, in Saturday's main event at UFC 135.
Jackson dropped some classic lines about Jones being cocky (1:04 mark). He also countered Jones talk about being a criminal justice major by saying he understands now why the young man would've been a great detective (2:40 mark). That was a thinly-veiled shot about the fighter's spygate scandal a few weeks back. Jackson's funniest material was about his mother not being welcomed at fights (3:12 mark).
SB Nation doesn't give Jones an out on this one. That site says Jones loses in these exchanges because he's a phony.
At today's final prefight presser, there were more contentious exchanges between champ and challenger.
"I'm glad Jon Jones is underestimating me. He'll be very surprised on Saturday. I think this is the best camp of my career because I was very motivated," Jackson said. "Muscle Farm had a great facility. It was state of the art. I haven't been this motivated in a long time."
Jones doesn't understand where the "underestimating" stuff is coming from.
" I'm positive that I've never stated that Rampage doesn't have the tools to beat me. Never did I say that in any interviews. He's a unified Champion and has knocked out some of the best in the world. I'm not underestimating Rampage at all. That would be a very, very ignorant thing for me to do, to underestimate somebody with such a great status," said Jones.
But he does believe older fighters are easier to beat because of accumulated damage.
"I think a big part of getting knocked out, it comes more and more with the older guys in the sport. Your ability to take punches goes away. I have a fresh chin. I have a fresh passion and a fresh heart and I think that's gonna get me out of a lot of things. I have a passion to not wanna get hit and because of how serious I take this sport, that's why my chin hasn't been tested. I put a lot of time in evading and movements," said Jones.
You can watch UFC 135 here on Yahoo! Sports
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