UFC ‘undisputed’ heavyweight champion Jon Jones might be flakier than a croissant right now, but interim champion Tom Aspinall is rather optimistic about their title unification fight. Jones has been avoiding the question like a plague in the leadup to his fight with Stipe Miocic at UFC 309. He had even claimed that he would need to see a very big cheque for fighting Aspinall; a cheque big enough that win or loss won’t matter.
Jones has even shown far more interest in fighting light heavyweights like Jamahal Hill and champion Alex Pereira since he believes those are established fighters whereas Aspinall is a ‘nobody’.
However, the UFC interim heavyweight champion believes that Jones is just playing his cards well. In an interview with Ariel Helwani, the British fighter explained that he had a conversation with Dana White and Hunter Campbell following UFC 309 and said,
“Jones is being a sassy little flirt over there with everybody and it’s great, it’s fantastic. I love it. And yes, this fight is going to happen, man… I don’t air people’s secrets out like that but what I can say is that it (meeting with White and Campbell) went very very positive.”
“Jon’s being a sassy little flirt… This fight is going to happen.”@AspinallMMA shares his level of optimism after meeting with the UFC brass after UFC 309 pic.twitter.com/ZSnqVDh1gr
— Ariel Helwani (@arielhelwani) November 18, 2024
White, of course, has stood his ground and claimed that Jones’ demand for a huge paycheck is nothing new. While he claimed he couldn’t share his actual purse, the UFC president assured that the Rochester native always got paid really well.
He has also claimed that knowing Jones, he would take the fight against Aspinall.
White sweetens the plot for Jones
After being bombarded with questions about Jones’ future, White has assured that if he were to have another fight in the UFC, it would have to be against Aspinall.
“Obviously a guy like Jon Jones had a career that if he wants something, we would do it but you can’t just want to do a ‘fun fight’ and not want to fight the interim heavyweight champion. The guy who’s next…Opportunities were given to Jon Jones… it’s his obligation to give it to the younger guy, to give him that opportunity.”
Of course, now having also claimed that Jones vs Aspinall would be the greatest heavyweight fight of all time, White has agreed to sweeten the plot for the undisputed champion. Speaking about the issue on The Pat McAfee Show, he said,
“If he beats Tom Aspinall then yes, I would do the Alex Pereira fight.”
This story has somehow had more drama than WWE has managed to pull off with the Bloodline in the last 4 episodes of RAW. For newer fans, of course, this is only a taste of what a usual Jon Jones fight week looks like. Hopefully, there’s at least one more to come.
