Jon Jones reveals what he has ‘heard’ about Ilia Topuria’s response to Justin Gaethje defeat

Jon Jones has shared his response to the shock defeat that Ilia Topuria suffered against Justin Gaethje on the UFC Freedom 250 event in June.

Ilia Topuria had been tipped as the most important favorite going into the primary defense of his lightweight championship reign after he won the title from Charles Oliveira.

The 29-year-old UFC star, who captured the lightweight title in 2025, had an undefeated 17-0 MMA record going into the Justin Gaethje fight on the White House.

Nevertheless, Gaethje defied the chances and emerged as the brand new lightweight champion after a hard-fought encounter with Topuria of their UFC Freedom 250 important event.

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Jon Jones on how Ilia Topuria has handled his UFC Freedom 250 setback against Justin Gaethje

Ilia Topuria was a bloodied mess when he took his seat on his corner stool after the fourth round of his thrilling clash with UFC star Justin Gaethje last month.

However the ex-featherweight and light-weight champion didn’t return for a fifth round within the UFC Freedom 250 showdown after his corner pulled him out of the fight.

Gaethje secured a sensational TKO win at UFC White House, and the 37-year-old American finally captured the title that had eluded him in his MMA profession.

Jon Jones has admitted that Topuria has already “realized” that he didn’t placed on his best performance and has tipped him to bounce back from his defeat to Gaethje.

“Ilia’s going to be in a very good position,” he told the Red Corner MMA YouTube channel.

“He has faith. He has a powerful team and that’s quite a lot of what it takes. He has a piece ethic. I feel he’s honest with himself.

“Ilia and I, we share the identical agent and we were talking about him earlier today and [from] what I heard was that he’s humble, that he’s honest.

“He realized that he just didn’t perform well. And I feel that’s the primary step of getting back into the ring in a healthy way.

“It’s the fellows that make excuses that’s when it’s hard to come back back and win that rematch.”

Is Jon Jones right to be offended about how his UFC profession has seemingly ended — or is he reaping what he sowed? 🤔

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Jon Jones tells Ilia Topuria to not fall into the trap other UFC fighters have

Jones said that Topuria cannot fall into the identical pitfall as other UFC stars by not being ‘honest’ with himself about his performance.

“Guys who just say, ‘You understand what, I could have done higher. I could have done more,’” he continued.

“Honesty with yourself is the important thing to MMA. Knowing exactly who you might be, what you’ve done, what you haven’t done.

“You may’t lie when you get in that cage. What’s real will come to the sunshine.”

Jones has not fought contained in the MMA octagon since his successful UFC heavyweight title defence against Stipe Miocic at UFC 309 at Madison Square Garden in 2024.

It’s currently unclear if Jones will ever return to the Octagon after his retirement announcement, and a fast U-turn resulted in a falling out with UFC CEO Dana White.