via thumbnails.truveo.com

Ben Fowlkes has an interesting article about Jones up at SI.com. Among the many interesting facts he reports on is something that is almost hard to believe:

"The gym I train at is a really small gym, a lot of wrestlers, so I didn't have a striking coach until this last fight," Jones said. "I had to teach myself how to strike."

Which may lead you to ask, how does one teach themself how to strike? Well the answer is simple really- YouTube!

"I would study a lot of videos on YouTube, or go to different websites where I could watch old Pride fights. I just became obsessed with MMA and watched videos over and over again. I learned the moves and took them to practice and started using them. Before I knew it I was considered a pretty good striker."

And that is also what led him to accept the fight with Bonnar, even though he had reservations about it at first:

When he was initially offered the fight with Bonnar, Jones said he was suspicious of the UFC's motives, wondering if it might be looking to take a young fighter "with lots of holes in his game" and feed him to the more experienced Bonnar. He told his manager he'd think about it. Then he did a little research on his own.

"I went online and watched a couple of his fights. I really focused on the fights that he lost, saw him at his weakest moments, and it inspired me to think that I could be better than him. I gave my manager a call back about three hours later and told him I'd take the fight," he said. "I dedicated my life to Stephan Bonnar. I knew how he moved. I knew his tendencies. I just became obsessed with him, and it paid off. The energy I put into preparing for him really showed, and it honestly surprised me how one-sided that fight was."

 He goes on to say how he was disappointed with himself for gassing so badly in the final round and how he thought he had trained really well for the fight and that his cardio wouldn't be a problem. He also said Dana White gave him a big bonus for having such an exciting fight. Overall this was a really good article about a very young guy that a lot of people (myself included) are very high on for the future. With his unorthodox teaching techniques he might just be GSP and Greg Jackson all rolled into one. With the talent this guy has now that he can actually afford to train properly the sky is the limit for him. Anyone who is a fan of his should definitely check out this article.