Dana White doubles down, says Jon Jones asked for “obscene” sum for Ngannou fight

By Tom Taylor - May 29, 2020

Dana White isn’t backing down on his claim that Jon Jones overreached in the negotiations for a potential fight with Francis Ngannou.

Dana White, Tony Ferguson

A heavyweight scrap between Jones, the UFC light heavyweight champ, and Ngannou, the heavyweight division’s top contender, was dominating the headlines earlier this month. Regrettably, the negotiations for the bout fizzled out. According to White, that’s because Jones asked for an “absurd” amount of money.

Shortly after White claimed that Jones’ demands were too high, Jones took to Twitter to accuse the UFC boss of lying.

“It’s interesting to just sit here and watch your boss lie to the camera like this,” Jones wrote in response to White on Twitter. “We never discussed any increase in pay. Immediately the conversation was that I already made enough. I never made a number offer.

“If you’re not going to change my contract for the heavyweight move, at least have the decency to be honest with the fans,” Jones added in a followup Tweet.

“I was over the situation, but I’m not gonna sit back and allow Dana to lie to the fans. I never asked for an absurd amount of money. That’s bullshit”

Despite these comments from Jones, White recently doubled-down on his accusation that Jones priced himself out of accusations for the Ngannou fight.


“Let me just put it this way,” White said on ESPN’s First Take on Friday morning. “Jon Jones wasn’t asking for $5 million more dollars; he was asking for an obscene amount of money. And if Jon Jones wants to speak publicly and say what the number was, that’s up to him.”

Suffice it to say that Dana White and Jon Jones are not seeing eye-to-eye on this one. How do you think the light heavyweight champ will respond?


Topics:

Dana White Jon Jones UFC