Daniel Cormier’s longtime coach calls for ‘cheater’ Jon Jones to be DQ’d from UFC GOAT debate

Decorated MMA coach Javier Mendez agrees with his star pupil, Daniel Cormier’s stance that Jon Jones shouldn’t be in the UFC GOAT discussion.

Despite being years removed from their two fights in the UFC Octagon, Daniel Cormier and Jon Jones remain fierce rivals outside of the cage. Their recent time spent as opposing coaches on a Russian reality television show demonstrates that tensions between the two sides remain high.

Cormier and Jones’s careers will always be linked, and their respective resumes are both in conversation for the greatest UFC fighter of all-time. Jones is widely considered the greatest fighter of all-time by most fans, pundits, and fellow athletes.

But Cormier believes Jones’s transgressions outside of the cage, including multiple failed drug tests, disqualify him from the conversation. Cormier’s longtime coach not only agrees with that sentiment, but in any other sport, it wouldn’t have been a discussion.

Javier Mendez on Jon Jones: ‘You pay the price, you should lose the prize’

In a recent appearance on The Ahmad Mahmood Show, coach Javier Mendez was asked where he puts Jones in the UFC GOAT conversation.

“I think Number One, at the moment, is Islam Makhachev. The GOAT for me is Khabib Nurmagomedov. I would put Jon Jones in that category, but I can’t, because you paid the price and you lost your prize,” Mendez said of Jones.

“If you’re caught doing something you shouldn’t have been doing, how can you be considered at the top of the league? In a true sport, you cannot put that person ahead. How many people have won Olympic gold medals, and then they found out that they cheated, they got their medals taken away from them?

“Well if it’s true for any other sport, it should be true for MMA too. So that’s the only reason why I don’t consider Jon the greatest,” Mendez continued on Jones. “I do consider one of them, but I would’ve considered him the greatest of all-time, one hundred percent.”

Where do you rank Jon Jones in the UFC GOAT debate? Let us know in the comments!