The admittedly "lil' arrogant" UFC light heavyweight champ Jon Jones has an explanation for why his last fight with Alexander Gustafsson was so close -- Jones says he didn't try all that hard. In fact, Jones has an exact number for how much he tried against Gustafsson while defending his UFC belt.

"Going into the Gustafsson fight I had just beaten Chael Sonnen, somebody that almost beat Anderson Silva twice, and I dominated Chael Sonnen in a minute and thirty seconds," said Jones during an interview with Jim Rome on Wednesday.

"I think for the first time in my career I really started to feel myself. I really started to think, 'Maybe I've got this extraordinary talent and maybe I just can't be touched.' I went 80 percent [against Gustafsson]. I'm not making any excuses. Gustafsson did a great job in the fight but I know that I had a lot more in me. I did some of the cardio tests that I normally do and my numbers weren't the same. Me knowing that, I still went into the fight thinking, 'Well, since I've performed excellent, maybe I'll still perform really really high, do really good and the fight may be a little closer if I just put half the effort in. I learned a lesson the hard way that you have to give full effort."

Jones probably found that his conditioning wasn't particularly helped by starting out his training camp for Gustafsson fat, either. So, that's another lesson he may have learned.

Those two can be added to the lesson Jones said he learned after nearly getting caught in an arm bar by Vitor Belfort in 2012 -- that he needs to train Brazilian Jiu Jitsu every day. Umm...yeah.

As a free tip to Greg Jackson and his camp, we've compiled a short list of other things his fighters will find slightly helpful to do on a daily basis - eating, breathing, sleeping.

Jones defends his UFC 205-pound belt once more on Saturday in Baltimore, against Glover Teixeira in the main event of UFC 172 on pay-per-view. Do you think Jones will take Teixeira seriously?

Let us know in the comments section.

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