UFC 140: GSP's Injury Opens the Door for Jon Jones to Become UFC's Biggest Star
The main event at UFC 140 will feature the light heavyweight title bout between current champion Jon “Bones” Jones and former champion Lyoto “The Dragon” Machida. This will be Jones’ second title defense and many believe his toughest challenge to date.
While these two competitors will be battling for a championship title, there may be more at stake for Jones than that; Georges St-Pierre will be missing significant time due to a knee injury.
A torn ACL will keep the UFC welterweight champion on the shelf for much of 2012, forcing the UFC’s hand in creating an interim title fight between Carlos Condit and Nick Diaz early in the year at UFC 143.
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St-Pierre is currently the UFC’s biggest star (according to UFC President Dana White). He has been so dominant within his division that he has even forced some of the other top contenders to leave the weight class, understanding that they have little to no chance of ever beating him.
With the injury keeping him out for so long, though, there is an opportunity for someone else to rise up and take that crown from him—and that person may very well be Jon Jones.
A win over Machida at UFC 140 would cap off what is unquestionably one of the greatest years any fighter has had in the history of the sport.
Victories over four top-10 opponents in Ryan Bader, Shogun Rua, Rampage Jackson and Lyoto Machida would be unprecedented in the sport today—and Jones will have done it at just 24 years old.
Jones already possesses the skills to be considered one of the top five pound-for-pound fighters in the sport. Not only that, his articulation and entertaining personality make him a dream for the media.
In fact, he has already begun the media rounds including making an important appearance on ESPN where he hyped the upcoming fight with Machida.
Although he doesn’t have quite the length of track record that someone like GSP or Anderson Silva does, nor does he have the pre-existing fame that Brock Lesnar did when he came to the UFC; Jon Jones possesses skills to supplant any of them as the biggest star in the sport.
From little-known prospect in 2010 to international star in 2011, the sky is the limit for Jones in 2012.
Of course, it all starts with what might be the biggest challenge of his career at UFC 140 in Toronto. Beat Machida and we may be looking at the next GSP. Lose to Machida and the hype may have all been for nothing.
Be sure to stay tuned to Bleacher Report for all things UFC 140. B/R is your home for complete coverage of the December 10 fight card, from pre-fight predictions to in-fight coverage, results and post-fight analysis.
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