UFC 135: Chael Sonnen Sounds off on the Rampage Jackson-Jon Jones Spygate

That’s right folks: UFC middleweight and trash talker extraordinaire Chael Sonnen decided to speak his mind about someone else’s controversy.

Long story short, Quinton “Rampage” Jackson, the challenger for the UFC light heavyweight title at UFC 135, swore that champion Jon Jones had a spy in Jackson’s camp. 

MMA Fighting transcribed the portion of Sonnen’s interview on Ariel Helwani’s MMA Hour where Sonnen addressed the matter in detail.

Jackson is the “biggest poor-me fighter” out there, Sonnen said. 

Needless to say, that was just the tip of the iceberg.  

“It’s silly,” Sonnen continued. “That’s why I’m saying this whole situation is ridiculous.  Look, I posted entire training session on the Internet at Athletebay.com.  The whole world could watch Yushin (Okami) and I spar.”

Sonnen also backed up his stance by citing that Oscar de la Hoya, “Sugar” Ray Leonard, “Iron” Mike Tyson, Randy Couture and Dan Henderson all had, or still have, open door policies for their workouts. 

The most outspoken Team Quest member acknowledged that he understands Jackson’s mindset in the situation, but he just cannot support that mindset. 

“But it’s a mental thing,” Sonnen stated.  “If Rampage wants to be Mr. Private, and that’s how he feels better, then let him.  Tito Ortiz is the same way. Tito doesn’t let guys watch him.  I don’t really get it. What could you possibly learn?”

“A guy’s got a couple hands, a couple feet and he’s going to use them all on the ring….So the whole thing was silly…but the Jones camp ruined it.”

In Sonnen’s mind, Greg Jackson’s camp missed out on a golden opportunity to get inside of Rampage’s head. 

“He (Rampage) actually skips the workout to see if that information gets back.  It does come back to him.  If you’re Jon Jones, why would you not keep that going? Why would you possibly stop that?” 

Given that Sonnen may arguably be the most cerebral fighter in the game, it is no surprise seeing that he was disappointed that Jones passed up an opportunity to get inside of Jackson’s head. 

Finally, Sonnen also hated the fact that Malki Kawa, Jones’ manager, publicly stated that there was no spy in the camp and that Jackson was just trying to “hype the fight.”

Sonnen felt that by saying those things, Kawa killed a lot of steam the fight had built up to this point. 

The middleweight contender, who will battle Brian Stann at UFC 136, went as far as to say that Jon Jones should have given Kawa a tongue lashing for his comments. 

“Jon Jones needs to silence that guy and keep him out of the media.  He does not have the rhetorical skills or the PR training to speak on this level.”

Jon Jones makes his first title defense against Quinton Jackson at UFC 135, at the Pepsi Center in Denver, Colorado.