Chael Sonnen

By Joshua Molina

Chael Sonnen is either really scared or performing a masterful verbal rope-a-dope on UFC light heavyweight champ Jon Jones.  That’s because he sounds like a man who believes he is about to lose.

Sonnen over the weekend told Fox Sports Radio that Jones is “considerably better than Anderson Silva.”  He also called Jones “the best talent our sport has ever seen.”

Of their April 27 fight, Sonnen said: “I may go down. He’s a good fighter. I may go down, but I promise you I will go like a gangster and I will be firing the entire time.”

Chael’s gone bonkers.

Sonnen has never held a world title, but he’s the undisputed king of promoting a fight. He’s the best trash talker in the business and his two fights with Silva turned the middleweight champ into a star.  Nobody wants to see a fight where a lovefest ensues during the buildup.

Sonnen’s greatest gift is making people believe he can win. If he’s gonna throw that away, the fight will be a big let-down.

Sonnen may be trying to let fans know ahead of time that he’s is probably going to lose. Maybe he can’t even trick his own brain into believing his nonsense anymore.  Or maybe Sonnen is playing a big time game of psychology. Maybe if he cozies up to Jones, he will disarm Jones when they step into the cage.

We all know Silva was raging against Sonnen when the two fought the second time. Look at how that turned out.

Maybe Sonnen, a huge wrestling fan, is mirroring the WWE’s storyline involving John Cena and The Rock.  Sonnen has cast himself as the hard-worked Cena, against the more athletic, faster Rock, in the “I might lose, but I will go down fighting” storyline.

That might work in wrestling. It doesn’t work in MMA.

If Sonnen doesn’t believe he can win, surely the fans aren’t going to buy it either.