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By: Jamie Penick, MMATorch Editor-in-Chief
"Rashad is saying he has my number, he knows what he can do, and he knows all this stuff. I know all this stuff as well [about him]. I do really good on improv. I'm excited to see what I can do with somebody I've went with several times before... When I spar my team, there's a level of respect that's always there. To let that clutch off for the first time and go into turbo mode on him, it's gonna be interesting. I know where he's open and I know where he's gonna try and take the fight... He's just flappin' his gums and talking to himself to try and convince himself that he's ready and that he has this and he has that over me... [He] went to school for psychology. I think I'm gonna prove in this fight that my psychology is together as well. I'll be able to exploit lots of things in Rashad Evans. Rampage just prepared me for Rashad.”
-UFC Light Heavyweight Champ Jon Jones talks to MMAWeekly.com about the difference between his time training with Rashad Evans and what he plans to do to Evans in the cage when they eventually meet.
Penick's Analysis: It's an interesting point Jones brings up about this matchup. While it's very possible each of them had some type of advantage over the other at times while they were training together, there's a completely different level of intensity when it comes to fight time. In training, they may have been going at a high pace, and at close to what could be considered "fight speed," but that doesn't mean they were going to go entirely full force in sparring. That doesn't mean that Jones will necessarily have a bigger advantage over Evans than otherwise, because Evans as well would have been in the same situation of not going off on Jones in practice. But that general knowledge of each other makes this a very interesting matchup, because they'll both know a lot about the other before they step into the cage, and we'll see how much that knowledge pays off in the Octagon.
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Jamie Penick, editor-in-chief
(mmatorcheditor@gmail.com)
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