Tom Aspinall vs. Jon Jones?
A dream matchup for the followers, however the undisputed heavyweight champion couldn’t care much less.
Aspinall is ready to defend his title towards Ciryl Gane at UFC 321 in Abu Dhabi on Oct. 25, a date that marks Aspinall’s first combat in 15 months. The first motive for Aspinall’s layoff was the uncertainty surrounding Jones, who gained a vacant title in November 2023, defended it as soon as, after which declined to satisfy Aspinall in a unification bout (Aspinall, throughout that very same stretch, gained and defended an interim title).
Jones retired this previous June, seemingly placing an finish to the dreary Aspinall-Jones saga for good, however shortly after Jones expressed curiosity in a comeback when President Donald Trump introduced plans for a UFC White Home occasion for Independence Day 2026 subsequent July. Meaning hypothesis has ramped up once more with reference to Aspinall lastly going through Jones, but when it have been as much as Aspinall, the dialogue could be useless and buried.
“It’s simply boring,” Aspinall stated when requested about Jones on The Ariel Helwani Present. “It’s simply so boring. I don’t actually have a touch upon it. It’s boring as hell. Don’t wish to speak about it.”
Aspinall made it clear he has little else to say in regards to the Jones scenario. When requested if the opportunity of combating his would-be rival on the White Home piqued his curiosity, Aspinall once more flatly present down the dialog.
“It has spent zero seconds on my thoughts,” Aspinall stated. “That’s it. I’m not and the world shouldn’t have an interest both as a result of what’s the purpose? It’s false hope.”
Curiosity in an Aspinall vs. Jones combat had as a lot to do with Jones’ unimaginable legacy because it did with the belts the boys held. Jones is extensively thought to be one of many biggest fighters of all time, having beforehand held the sunshine heavyweight title for over 1500 days, and holding just one loss in 30 professional bouts, which got here through disqualification. He later captured the heavyweight title, however solely logged one protection of that belt towards fellow legend Stipe Miocic earlier than happening hiatus. Following his retirement, Aspinall was promoted from interim to undisputed champion.
With Jones is out of the image, Gane’s coach Fernand Lopez just lately stated the stress is all on Aspinall to ship a dominant efficiency at UFC 321 since Aspinall made such a public present of calling out Jones for therefore lengthy. If that’s the case, Aspinall welcomes the problem.
“That’s nice as a result of I combat actually, actually, rather well underneath stress,” Aspinall stated. “There’s a few sorts of guys-I’ve been round martial arts my entire life, close to sufficient at this point-and there’s the fellows who I’ve skilled with from my expertise who within the gymnasium are absolute killers, absolute world beaters, and so they’ll get in a combat and so they’ll simply freeze up. It doesn’t work prefer it does within the gymnasium. They combat manner worse.
“There’s different guys like myself who will not be that good within the gymnasium, however get underneath the lights, get underneath the stress with all of the chips on the desk and so they get in there and do issues that they’d by no means be capable of do within the gymnasium. And that’s precisely what I do and I really feel like that’s certainly one of my greatest strengths, so any time there’s stress on me, that’s after I’ve accomplished my most devastating performances and if [Lopez] believes that, that’s a implausible factor for me.”
