Overlooking Jon Jones, Alex Pereira and Islam Makhachev, Joe Rogan identifies unexpected current fighters as most well-rounded
Alex Pereira and Jon Jones did not get shouted out by Joe Rogan when he was recently asked about the most well-rounded fighter in mixed martial arts today. Not even the number one ranked pound-for-pound fighter in the UFC today, Islam Makhachev got that nod.
While the light heavyweight, heavyweight, and lightweight champions, respectively, were all not mentioned, another UFC titleholder got that distinction from Rogan. On JRE MMA Show #159, Joe Rogan was speaking with Quinton 'Rampage' Jackson and the two covered several subjects during their three-plus hour chat.
When asked by Jackson on who the UFC commentator thinks is the most well-rounded fighter in MMA today, Rogan said:
"That's a good question. It's hard to say. You know, it's hard to say. Might be Sean O'Malley. Sean O'Malley's not the best wrestler but damn his takedown defense is f**king good because he survived against Aljamain [Sterling], you know."
He added:
"I mean Aljamain couldn't take him down. He can knock anybody out with one shot. He submitted Takanori Gomi in a jiu jitsu match. His jiu jitsu's real like Sean can do everything and he's just a relentless, tireless worker."
Check out Joe Rogan's thoughts on MMA's most multi-faceted fighter today (1:58:24) below:
Alex Pereira and how Rampage Jackson would approach a theoretical fight with him
Alex Pereira is the only man to have captured the middleweight and light heavyweight titles in the UFC. The former 205-pound titleholder in Jackson was also recently thinking about how a fight between the two might play out. This conversation also took place on the referenced Joe Rogan podcast episode from above.
The 46-year-old was speaking to Rogan and Jackson mentioned how he'd been recently thinking about how he would fare in his prime if he were to test skills with Alex Pereira. The man who first unified PRIDE and UFC titles initially mentioned how he probably wouldn't have tried to take down the Brazilian KO artist.
Jackson then used some colorful language to express how once the former multi-division Glory kickboxing champion started to gain the upper hand in the standup, then he might consider utilizing his wrestling skills to take Alex Pereira down to the mat.
Rogan responded by praising Jackson's wrestling skills and thinks those abilities could have given 'Poatan' some problems in this scenario.
The Tennessee native showcased a lot of explosive wrestling skill and strength in the grappling department earlier in his career. Jackson then seemed to favor a largely boxing-centric game in recent years and he may just don the big gloves sooner than later to fight in the sweet science against a familiar foe.