Penick's Take
PENICK: Jon Jones - the UFC's soul-stealing Shang Tsung - beat Daniel Cormier at his own game
Jan 4, 2015 - 1:45:30 PM PENICK: Jon Jones - the UFC's soul-stealing Shang Tsung - beat Daniel Cormier at his own game

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By: Jamie Penick, MMATorch Editor-in-Chief

Jon Jones, the shape-shifting, soul stealing Shang Tsung of the UFC, claimed another victim on Saturday night at UFC 182, grinding out Daniel Cormier to defend his title for the eighth time.

It's an uncanny talent that Jones has showcased in fight after fight as Champion, taking the best aspects his opponents possess and using those same skills against them. Cormier became the latest to find out how capable he is of doing that, and Jones said after the fight it absolutely wasn't by accident.

"Leading up to the fight, I watched his fights so many times. I really think I start to channel the fighter I'm fighting against," Jones explained on the post-fight show on Fox Sports 1. "Because I watch him so many times, in my subconscious, his skillset becomes comfortable. I almost adopt his set of skills. So you saw me kind of Daniel Cormier Daniel Cormier."

It's not just talk, either. This is what Jones does, and it's why he's the most dynamic, unpredictable, and wholly unique fighter the UFC has ever seen.

Where former UFC Welterweight Champion Georges St-Pierre excelled in exploiting the weaknesses of his opponents, Jones finds where his foes are best, and beats them at their own game. He's so prideful of that ability that he's not even concerned about whether or not it's the best thing for fans, because he was out to prove a point against Cormier more than anything else.

"He held Frank Mir against the cage - who's one of my dear friends - he held him against the cage, and that's what I did to him," Jones said. "He says he's the king of the grind; at points, the crowd was booing, and if you're a fan it's not the most entertaining, but I out-grinded him, I held him against the cage. He could not get off the cage... It wasn't a pretty fight, it wasn't technically a sexy fight, but I proved that he wasn't the king of the grind tonight, I was the king of the grind."

The 27-year-old Champion echoed those comments at the post-fight press conference, but took an even more sinister tone with the way he mimics his opponents.

"As far as beating him in somewhat of his own style, I watched him fight so much that I actually absorb who he is," Jones explained. "I absorbed grinding. I watched him hold my boy Frank Mir against the cage, and I was just like (nods head), 'I see what you're doing there.' Just watching my opponent so much I start to subconsciously inherit their talent, and their gifts. So a lot of times you see me do exactly what they would want to do to me, I end up doing it to them."

That he does.

Cormier is just the latest to fall victim to Jones' particular breed of malice, and it continues to expand the types of things we've seen out of young Champion. Try to think of the last time a Jones fight played out exactly like any of his others. It just doesn't happen, which makes him nigh impossible to gameplan for.

The 35-year-old former Olympian, like many men before him, thought he had the gameplan set to figure Jones out. He even had some success early inside, connecting on strikes and taking the second round off the Champ. But it ultimately played into what Jones wanted to do, because he used that in-close range to pepper Cormier with body strikes, wear him down, and out-wrestle the wrestler.

"Leading up to this fight, I knew that this fight would be like an Ali-Frazier type thing," Jones said. "Tonight I tried to do my version of the rope-a-dope. I knew I could beat him in the cardio department, so a lot of times you would see me - not to say he didn't earn the punches he scored - I accepted him expending his energy, and in the Championship rounds he started to break."

"I've been really blessed to have a good chin on me. I don't like taking hits, but he wasn't hurting me with his shots, so I was letting him miss punches, miss kicks, and land shots that [weren't] doing too much damage to me," he continued. "I've [got] some good friends in the wrestling community, especially my wrestling coach, and he's known to break. When you put it on him, or you don't submit to his alpha, he slows down. He did it against Cael Sanderson several times... whenever somebody would face him, be a man, man up to him, he breaks. He says he's the king of the grind. He's not."

"I just knew when the cardio started to become a factor, he was going to look for a way out."

It's not dissimilar to the way he attacked Chael Sonnen in 2013, taking the one area Sonnen was supposed to have any success and turning that on its head. Or the way he utilized the clinch against a very good clinch fighter in Glover Teixeira, injuring the challenger's arm early and beating him everywhere from there.

For a while in September of 2013, Alexander Gustafsson managed to throw him off, and Jones wasn't quite as prepared; but that's when he adjusted on the fly, turning it around on the challenger and out-striking him down the stretch in the same manner Gustafsson had tried to attack early on in the fight.

Jones didn't have nearly the amount of time to prep for Vitor Belfort as he did the others, so it was more about the physical dominance he employed in that fight which opened things up for the finish. Go back before that, though, and you see signs of Jones' abilities to mimic opponents manifesting in his wins over Lyoto Machida and Rashad Evans.

In the Machida fight, Jones needed to figure out the counter-striking, which gave him some problems in the first round. He did that, and it was counter-strikes in the second that hurt Machida and left him open for the standing guillotine choke. Against Evans, Jones took what had become Evans' game - utilizing his wrestling more to keep certain fights standing - and won the striking battle with a uniquely Jonesian combination of elbows, kicks, punches, and more.

This is something we've not really seen from any other fighter in this sport's history, and it's not the type of thing one can just develop, either. There's very clearly an aspect to Jones' innate skill-set that can't simply be taught. No, he puts everything into his training, and studies his competitors like no other, to the point he is truly absorbing certain tendencies.

These aren't the ravings of an over-confident, full-of-himself competitor. It's simple truth from the best fighter in the world, and a scary reality for any fighter trying to get in line to challenge him.

[Jon Jones art by Grant Gould (c) MMATorch.com]