Former UFC light heavyweight champion Jon Jones has been kicked out of the Jackson-Wink MMA gym following his latest arrest in Las Vegas.
Jones has been a staple at Jackson-Wink MMA in Albuquerque, New Mexico for over the past decade. However, after his latest arrest in Las Vegas for alleged domestic battery, Jones’ coaches at Jackson-Wink MMA had no choice but to tell him he is no longer allowed at the gym until he gets his act together. Speaking to Ariel Helwani on The MMA Hour, Jones’ longtime striking coach Mike Winkeljohn confirmed that Jones is no longer welcome at the gym until he gets his act together. Winkeljohn also told Jones to stop drinking.
.@mmacoachwink tells @arielhelwani that Jon Jones, at least for the moment, is not allowed in the JacksonWink gym:
"I feel I had to do that. … He might hate me for it, but I had to tell him the truth."
▶️ WATCH #TheMMAHour: https://t.co/ZnfU9so6A1 pic.twitter.com/1lqMWG6QgM
— MMAFighting.com (@MMAFighting) October 13, 2021
“I’m very disappointed. It’s tough. The hardest part was when you hear that his daughter says you have to call the police officers. It’s tough from my standing, I’ve got three daughters. I have a wife and three daughters, I teach women’s self-defense called Smart Girls self-defense. It just makes it hard when he keeps getting in trouble,” Winkeljohn said of Jones. “But I just had a conversation with him. I said, ‘Jon, here’s the deal man. You’re like my little brother. You have to stop drinking and fix these things for a certain period of time until you come back to the gym. So at the moment, he’s out of the gym. He’s not allowed to come into the gym. I felt like I had to do that because ignoring it and expecting different results, as they say, is insanity. He’s got a lot of yes people around him that won’t tell him the truth. He might hate me for it, but I had to tell him the truth. But in my heart, God, that guy’s good for greatness. And I’m not just talking about fighting. In my heart, I hope Jones comes back and wins the heavyweight title, stops drinking, and goes forward, and goes onto bigger things. Oh my goodness. He’s so charismatic and so damn smart and he can sit down and break down and fights and he can sit down and break down a lot of things in life. He’s capable of doing much bigger things than just this MMA world. That’s where we are right now, but we’ll see what happens in the future. I hope him all the best.”
Do you think Mike Winkeljohn and Greg Jackson made the right call kicking Jon Jones out of the gym?