All indication at the moment suggest Jon Jones will hang up his gloves by November this year. He will take on Stipe Miocic with the heavyweight title on the line at UFC 309 at the historic Madison Square Garden and win or lose it would be a fitting end to his career. However, there is one man who is not entirely convinced, Chael Sonnen.
Uncle Chael’s concept is simple. Jones has family, families need money, and fighting for the UFC gets him paid and so he can’t retire yet. Besides, there’s the Tom Aspinall problem he has to deal with as well.
So, in a recent Instagram video, Sonnen simply said:
“Not only does he run the jeopardy of convincing himself, Aspinall might just get on with it. He’s got kids and a wife at home, I’m sure a lot of guys don’t want to show up to work, it doesn’t work that way.”
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And it makes sense, Jones and UFC light heavyweight champion Alex Pereira are the same age. One of them has fought 3 times already this year while the other has not fought in over a year now. And even though, ‘Bones’ he has been doing this for over a decade now, as has Pereira across the world.
The former UFC fighter also pointed out that when Jones was actually asked about the Stipe fight being his last dance, he had answered with “most likely”. Now, according to Uncle Chael, this changes everything as Jones might not have commented on his retirement at all.
Because “most likely” still keeps the doors open, and at this stage in Jones career, that’s all he needs.
That said, things may change if Stipe ends up being up injured in the lead up to the November card.
Will Jones fight Aspinall at UFC 309 if…
Tom Aspinall is officially the backup fighter for UFC 309. The UFC interim heavyweight champion has already defended his faux title before Jones has defended his real one.
Ideally Aspinall’s last fight should have been against Jones for the undisputed title. Despite not being happy about it, the Brit managed to finish the fight within the first round. And then he went on to ask UFC president Dana White to use him as the backup fighter for UFC 309.
Aspinall has wanted that undisputed gold so badly that he had even told the public that he would take the Madison Square Garden fight in an hour’s notice if he had to.
So if something were to happen to either of the fighters on short notice, the Brit will step in to replace them.
At least, on paper, that’s the idea.
However, former UFC heavyweight champion Daniel Cormier doesn’t think so.
“If one of those dudes (Jones or Miocic) gets hurt, neither one of them is fighting Tom Aspinall. No way…..If somebody gets hurt get ready for Tom Aspinall vs. Ciryl Gane.”
‘DC’ does not think either of the two fighters will take on Tom Aspinall on short notice. And that makes sense, two ageing fighters close to retirement, one fight away from cementing their legacy forever would not want to get beaten by a 20-something-yeear old freakishly big and freakishly fast man.
Predicting a different fight entirely if either one of them pulls out, DC added:
“It’s not even about being scared. It’s not even, it’s about risk management Chael. Whoever, if someone gets hurt in this fight, the reward versus the risk of fighting Tom Aspinall is so great, I don’t believe that either of them will do it. Love that it’s a part of the story now. We all love the story, we love a great story but I don’t know that plays.”
Besides, winning against Aspinall won’t do much for Jones since he’s already beaten legends but losing to Aspinall will undo years of hard work.
