Daniel Cormier: UFC Champ Jon Jones good enough to fight anyone on eight days notice

By: Jamie Penick, MMATOrch Editor-in-Chief

Daniel Cormier will make his UFC debut sometime next year, but with the turmoil that hit the UFC this last week with the cancellation of UFC 151 and the UFC scrambling for a new opponent for Jones, he would have liked the opportunity to do so earlier.

"Right now no one wants to fight Jon Jones, but s*** I'll do it, I'll fight Jon Jones,? Cormier said in an interview with BJPenn.com. "Guys are turning down the fight; you have to go to an old school fighter like Vitor Belfort to step up to the plate. That's no knock on Machida or Shogun, but if those guys want to coach on The Ultimate Fighter and move off to the side and let me fight Jones, I'll do it. If no one wants the title shot then give it to Daniel!"

Cormier chimed in on the UFC 151 cancellation issue as well, agreeing with those who believe Jones should have just taken the fight with Chael Sonnen to save the event. However, his reasoning isn't to necessarily criticize Jones, so much as it's a belief that it didn't matter who Jones was facing there, he'd have beaten them on eight day's notice.

"My idea is this - and this is the God's honest truth - Jones can fight anyone on eight days notice, he's that good," Cormier said. "With that being said I think he should've taken the fight. If you listened to what Rashad Evans said it was kind of Jones' obligation to the UFC to stop the cancellation of the card. They've gotten behind him, I mean obviously his skills are what have gotten him a long way, but they have pushed him out to the front. They have made him a lot of money and put him in big fights. I'm almost 100% sure without knowing they played a hand in him landing the deal with Nike. There are a lot of reasons why he should have taken the fight, but the main one is he could have beaten 98% of the guys in the world on eight days notice."

Penick's Analysis: There may be truth to that belief. We won't be able to find out on Saturday, unfortunately, but Jones may be the type of elite fighter who could take on any challenge on that short of notice and defeat them. He and his camp obviously didn't feel comfortable testing that idea with his title on the line, but the skills are there for him to do just that. Cormier may get his chance to face Jones at some point down the line, and indeed it's a matchup that could be quite interesting considering Cormier's elite wrestling skills. But for now, he's got Frank Mir ahead of him and a move to the UFC to concern himself with, and he can take things from there in 2013 and beyond.

Source: http://www.mmatorch.com/artman2/publish/UFC_2/article_14265.shtml

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