Jon Jones eyes future grappling match with heavyweight – but would prefer to kick Daniel Cormier's ass

While Jon Jones (22-1 MMA, 16-1 UFC) has Dan Henderson (32-15 MMA, 6-7 UFC) ahead of him at Sunday’s Submission Underground 2 event in Oregon, “Bones” is already thinking about future possibilities in the grappling world.

“I’m aware that I may be a little heavier than Dan, so I’d like to maybe challenge a heavyweight after this to see how I stack up against a guy who’s much bigger than I am,” Jones said today on a media conference call promoting the event “No one in particular though.”

Former UFC light heavyweight champion Jones and MMA legend Henderson meet in the main event of this weekend’s Submission Underground 2 event, an upstart grappling event that streams live for FloSports subscribers from Portland’s Roseland Theater.

There’s history in the matchup, of course, with Jones and Henderson initially expected to meet under MMA rules in the main event of UFC 151 in September 2012. Injury forced Henderson off the card, and Jones infamously declined a short-notice fight with Chael Sonnen, who now coincidentally serves as the promoter for Sunday’s grappling event.

Jones said that history “didn’t really play that much of a part” in him taking part in the Submission Underground 2 match but does admit “it’s all part of the storyline now.”

Instead, Jones – who’s currently serving a one-year U.S. Anti-Doping Agency suspension from MMA for a doping violation – sees grappling as a means for him to keep his skills sharp, but he knows that Henderson, who recently retired from MMA after he fell just short of claiming the UFC middleweight title, might not answer all the questions fans have when it comes to Jones’ grappling abilities.

“I’d like to be a part of this FloGrappling family and do lots of events, use this platform to kind of give a little back to the jiu-jitsu community, which is a very important community in mixed martial arts, and also stay active and do something for the fans,” Jones said. “I would love to beat Dan on the 11th, and then I’m sure a lot of people will say, ‘Oh, you’re a lot bigger than Dan.’ I’d like to follow that up with a victory over a heavyweight in the next show.”

But even Jones, widely considered one of the greatest mixed martial artists all times (if not the greatest), admits that competing against lifelong jiu-jitsu specialists probably isn’t in the cards. Instead, he’d rather compete against fellow MMA fighters under the Submission Underground banner.

So what about possibly facing current UFC light heavyweight champion Daniel Cormier? After all, the two rivals have a clear disdain for each other, and while Cormier (18-1 MMA, 6-1 UFC) is currently competing at 205 pounds, he did claim the Strikeforce heavyweight grand prix in 2012 and competed as a heavyweight for the first 15 fights of his MMA career.

“Man, that would be a hell of a match, but no,” Jones said. “I wouldn’t want to play with Cormier at all. Me and Cormier’s storyline is so big and important to me, and I wouldn’t want to give him any false sense of security or anything. I just want to kick his ass with my hands and feet and elbows and knees.”