Anthony Smith Doesn't See Anyone Beating Jon Jones In His First Attempt, Including Thiago Santos

Former UFC light heavyweight title challenger Anthony Smith believes Jon Jones won’t be beaten by anyone on his first attempt, including Jones’ latest challenger Thiago Santos, whom he meets at UFC 239 this Saturday night.

Smith fought for the belt against Jones back in March at UFC 235 and was thoroughly outclassed throughout the fight, with the champ cruising to victory via unanimous decision over the five round fight to retain his belt.

To Smith’s credit, he got back in the saddle and accepted a short-turnaround fight against the dangerous Swede Alexander Gustafsson in “The Mauler’s” hometown of Sweden just last month, finishing him by rear-naked choke in the fourth round.

“Lionheart” said he found it hard to prepare for someone like Jones with his arsenal of attacks but gained valuable fight experience by sharing the Octagon with him. Speaking to The Mac Life, Smith said while Jones’ opponent this weekend is known for his power, he’ll probably fall short just like every other fighter who fights the champion on their first attempt.

“I said the same s--- going into it,” Smith said. “It is not that simple. Now that I have 25 minutes of data on Jon Jones it totally looks different the second time around, but you are right; it is different. [Jones] is very different. There is no way of knowing that or training for that until you are in there with him. That’s the thing. I don’t want to just outright say it, but it is going to be hard to beat Jon Jones the first time for anybody, it really is. Unless you catch him, he’s going to be hard to beat on the first time. Thiago could catch anybody though, that dude is dangerous, he’s explosive [and] he could hurt anybody. I just don’t see him getting close enough to Jon to do it.”