So the most awaited UFC bout in recent months is just days away. Jon Jones will defend his title when he faces Rashad Evans Saturday night. This fight though is very different from others mainly because these two opponents used to be very close friends, training partners and members of the same gym.

The media is taking advantage of this into making it the most dramatic fight in history but facts are facts. Evans and Jones in all reality were very close, so there is no need to exaggerate anything. The question is what happened between these two people that today they are tied in one of the fiercest rivalries in the sports history.

It goes beyond just two men, as the gym and the team that Jon Jones trains with are also split up between whose side they are on. Some see this as a professional bout between two icons and prefer to say that emotions don’t get in the way but reality has proven different. It has caused some in the Jon Jones camp to decline sparring with him or helping him train, people who have known Evans when Jones was merely a teenager. It caused Evans to completely part ways with his long time coach, friend and mentor in Greg Jackson. Evans and Greg worked together for years but now Greg is the main guy in Jon Jones’s corner and Evans feels betrayed.

According to Evans he along with George St. Pierre are the reasons that Greg Jackson and his gym are even on the map. Some of that might actually be true, because what would a gym or a coach be without the uber talents that they produced. It is never 100% coaching but also the dedication and pure talent of the fighters so in a way I agree with Evans here.

Either way this should definitely be a show down to remember with Jon Jones being the favourite marked at minus 588 and Evans sitting at plus 400. Interesting to see if the champ will continue his improbable rise to stardom or will it be cut short by a living legend.

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