It's time! The moment we have all been waiting for! This Saturday night is UFC 285, we finally get to see the GOAT return to the octagon after three long years. Jon"Bones" Jones vs Ciryl Gane for the UFC Heavyweight Championship. As we know there is currently no champion. The fight everyone really wanted to see was Jones vs former UFC Heavyweight Champion and superstar, Francis Ngannou. That would have made for a lot more of an interesting fight, but honestly, who cares. Jon Jones is fighting! Jon has a professional record of 26-1. His one loss is a DQ. This was way back in 2009 on the season 10 Finale of The Ultimate Fighter against Matt Hamill in a fight in that Jones was out-striking Hamill 55-7. It ended at the end of the first round when Jon landed an illegal 12/6 elbow to a grounded Hamill. In the UFC you can not land a straight-down elbow on a grounded opponent. It's kind of stupid because Jon should have actually won this fight via first-round TKO. That is the only blemish on the resume of Jon Jones. Ciryl Gane's only loss, on the other hand, comes against Francis Ngannou. Francis just out-grappled Gane and Gane had zero answers for Francis's grappling. Gane has a real loss on his record as opposed to Jon's asterisk due to a young error.
Jon is long removed from The Ultimate Fighter. Jon has had a full hall-of-fame career in the Light Heavyweight division. He has fourteen title defenses, ten knockouts, and six submissions. Jon is the undisputed greatest of all time. In Jon's career, he has defeated so many legends: Stephan Bonnar, Ryan Bader (current Bellator Heavyweight champ), Shogun Rua, Rampage Jackson, Lyoto Machida, Rashad Evans, Vitor Belfort, Chael Sonnen, Alexander Gustafsson x2, Glover Teixeira, Daniel Cormier x2, Ovince St. Preux, and Anthony Smith. His other two title defenses are against a prime Thiago Santos and Dom Reyes. Many will argue that Dom Reyes beat Jon Jones, but we debunked that in our UFC 285 overview yesterday. You should check it out if you missed it. Yet, now it's time for Jon to begin a new career in the Heavyweight division. Jon's first fight as we know is for the title. If you are complaining that he's skipping the Heavyweight rankings, please tell me who you believe has a more deserving resume in the comment section.
Ciryl Gane has shown a lot of promise in his young UFC career. He's been an Interim Heavyweight Champion. His impressive victories are against Tai Tuivasa, Derrick Lewis, Alexander Volkov, and Jairzinho Rozenstruik who are all still in the top 10 Heavyweight rankings. Gane also beat an old Junior Dos Santos in 2020. Gane lost to his toughest opponent. There's no shame in losing to the best in the division, but that's why Jon is the best ever. You can't say he lost to his toughest opponents because he beat every one of them. Look at that list in the last paragraph. As much as I love watching Tai Tuivasa and Derrick Lewis they just aren't the caliber of fighters Daniel Cormier or Rashad Evans were. Gane has never fought anyone like Jon. Not even Francis. Ngannou is amazing, but I'm not sure if he studies and knows his opponents the way Jon does.
The DraftKings line right now is Jones (-165) vs Gane (+140). As soon as all the props and everything are released Opinion Octagon is going to figure out what the parlay will look like. As of right now, we are still one hundred percent adding Jones to the parlay. I can't see adding a method of victory as Jon is the king of finishing his opponent however he has to. Regardless, the return of the GOAT is only four days away and it can't come soon enough!
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