SUNDAY NEWS DIGEST 2/17: Jon Jones responds to Cain Velasquez ‘I feed on picograms of self doubt,’ MVP doesn’t think Daley rivalry is over, and more

By Michael Hiscoe, Managing Editor

Jon Jones (photo credit Mark J. Rebilas © USA Today Sports)

On lock

Jon Jones has been non-committal when it comes to talk of moving up to heavyweight, but he showed his hand a bit this weekend. Cain Velasquez told TMZ earlier in the week that he “thinks” he’s good enough to beat Jones should the two ever meet. Jones responded to these claims on Instagram with a post that intimates that Cain Velasquez may not be at his most confident right now and that a move to heavyweight for Jones is only a matter of time.

“Your confidence is going to have to be on lock in order to beat me my guy. Can’t be talking about “I think I can.” I feed off picograms of self-doubt, and I can smell it from miles away. For now let’s just focus on the fights ahead of us. My heavyweight days are inevitable.”

https://www.instagram.com/p/Bt7Sdl7lfbw/

Velasquez will have to take every picogram of confidence he has and put it to work against the always dangerous Francis Ngannou tonight. If it goes well for him, a fight with Jones in the near future could be in order.

It’s not done

Michael “Venom” Page took a perhaps underwhelming unanimous decision win from Paul Daley at Bellator 216 Saturday night. With the win in hand though, Page knows that this rivalry likely isn’t over.

“It’s out of the way, but in all honesty, it’s not done,” Page told media following the fight. “I’m somewhat happy, obviously getting a win. But the way it finished, I’m not happy with and it might mean actually bringing this fight to the U.K. in the future.”

While Page wasn’t thrilled with his performance, he doesn’t place all of the blame on himself.

“I made a lot of mistakes myself. But at the same time, I told you guys he was a bitch. He talked all this stuff about being able to knock me out and he ran the whole first round. And then all he wanted to do was play groundwork,  play wrestling.”

The Page-Daley fight seemed like a lock for a United Kingdom Bellator event but the timing and scheduling of the fight just didn’t work out. If a rematch is booked, it almost has to be in the UK. Hopefully, local fans get more of an exciting fight than the fans in Connecticut did last night. A rematch will have to wait though until Page is done with the welterweight grand prix. His second round fight will be against Douglas Lima in May.

Sunday Notebook

-Cheick Kongo called out Bellator heavyweight champion Ryan Bader after the fights last night. “So I want to say something clear: Ryan, wherever you are, just come to give me the belt so I can make it easy for you. If not, I will f— you up.”

In case you missed it

ROUNDTABLE: Staff predictions for Francis Ngannou vs. Cain Velasquez

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