Jones on Diaz brawl: ‘Play fighting with Nate was not the best idea’

Jon Jones is sharing his view on what happened to Nate Diaz on the set of ALF Reality, the Russian Ultimate Fighter clone currently being filmed in Thailand.

Jones and Diaz were set to coach opposite each other on the latest season of the show, which has previously featured Aljamain Sterling vs. Peter Yan, and Khamzat Chimaev vs. Arman Tsarukyan. But Diaz and his team stormed off set after regular series prankster Zalimkhan “Zalik” Yusupov kicked off a brawl on day one that reportedly involved ALF Reality crew members attacking members of Diaz’s entourage.

“We had one of our young fighters, a guy named Zalik,” Jones told Red Corner MMA. “He was playing with Nate. He wanted to play fight with Nate. Nate kind of came in a little bit on edge, I think he had some previous beef with some Russian fighters. So he was a little bit on edge when he got here.”

“Play fighting with Nate was was not the best idea. It became serious right away and we had to replace Nate.”

Zalik made headlines during filming of last season’s Russian TUF clone when he seemed to choke Aljamain Sterling unconscious. But more recent footage from that incident shows it was all part of a prank to stress out Petr Yan, who had guaranteed the safety of “Funkmaster” on set. After a tense moment for Yan (and an appearance from Hasbulla), Sterling ‘woke up’ and sang happy birthday to a relieved Yan.

Zalik clearly made a positive impression on Jon Jones after the GOAT’s arrival in Thailand — there’s videos of them hugging and boozing and riding a scooter around together. But whatever prank Yusupov was cooking with Diaz clearly went sideways because it resulted in the Stockton crew leaving after day one of filming.

“You know, I’ve been around the Bushido spirit for a long time,” Jones said of the vibe on set at ALF Reality. “That martial art spirit where everybody has a certain degree of [respect], certain rules you don’t cross, like a martial arts spirit and everything. And I don’t think there’s a lot of that here. Some guys are like warriors and some guys are really just kind of street fighters, you know?”

“There’s there’s insults, there’s weapons. This show … there’s nothing like it. There’s really nothing like it.”

We’ll keep you up to date on any of the other shenanigans going on in Thailand, and whether Jones makes any more statements regarding his fighting future. A few days ago he straight up said he was done fighting. Let’s see what today holds.