Following his announcement of a new partnership with Mark Zuckerbeg’s Meta, UFC boss Dana White has once more come under fire from fans over a lack of traction on a well-overdue title fight.
White, the promotion’s long-time CEO, confirmed this afternoon how the organization is set to rejig its ranking system. It doesn’t truly come as a surprise since for more than a year now, he has been voicing his concern with the ranking criteria and placement of fighters.
After linking with Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, White has instructed the combat enthusiast to work up a new AI (artificial intelligence) rankings system.
Set to come into effect later this annum, White’s bone of contention had long been argued to be the placement of heavyweight champion, Jon Jones, on the pound-for-pound pile, among other things- something he hopes the META AI fixes for him.
“We’ve already started to work on some innovations with Meta around a new fighter rankings system that will debut later this year,” White said in a video posted to Instagram. “Thank God”, he noted.
However, fans are not so happy with this latest development since a new ranking system doesn’t fall even in the top 10 things they want from the UFC.
“We want Jones vs Aspinall not Meta glasses ffs Dana…” a user posted in response on X.
We want Jones vs Aspinal not Meta glasses ffs Dana…
— Aaron Nance (@7he7empestKing) April 2, 2025
Others wanted White to be reminded about the quality of the shows he puts on these days. “The fights this year have been terrible so far with more to come“, a fan said.
Aspinall urged to get another fight
Winning his title back in 2023, Aspinall has yet to be booked in an obvious unification pairing with Jones since. Staggeringly, he has spent over 500 days as an interim champion and has already joined an exclusive list of fighters to successfully defend his interim belt.
Furthermore, reports have claimed Jones would require six months to prepare for a fight with Aspinall, should a deal be agreed on at all.
And this is something former UFC icon Demetrious Johnson doesn’t want Aspinall to do.
“If I were Tom Aspinall, I’d be like, ‘God, dude, like I’m not f*cking waiting six months,’” Johnson told Submission Radio.
“Like, y’all need to get me another fight. But then again, this could be the biggest fight of his career if he’s able to beat Jon Jones. I have mixed feelings on the six months. I think that Tom Aspinall should take another fight”, noted Johnson.
And even more so, ‘Mighty Mouse’ is concerned about the UFC icing out Aspinall for as long as they have so far, largely to accommodate Jones.
“I think when you put an athlete who’s very young like that on ice. And they don’t get that ring time, they don’t get that opportunity to get out there and just fight and make the money”, the Mighty Mouse explained, asserting Aspinall should move on.
