$30 million, and now you’re thinking of Jon Jones, and for good reason. It just so happens to be the magical number that keeps popping up every time the UFC heavyweight champion has to fight someone as a consensus underdog. That’s what he has supposedly asked for Tom Aspinall, but did you know Dana White had once claimed it was his price for fighting Francis ‘The Predator’ Ngannou?
Yes, in an interview from April 2021, when Ngannou was still with the promotion, having just been crowned its heavyweight monarch, the UFC president had asserted he wasn’t particularly thrilled with Jones calling the shots.
At the time, Jones’ highly anticipated move to heavyweight looked like it was officially on pause. The former light heavyweight champ had been teasing a fight with the Cameroonian ‘Predator’ but was asking for a guaranteed $30 million, a number the UFC wasn’t willing to meet.
Eerily, that does sound extremely similar to the demands of ‘f*ck you’ money he’s been asking for the heavyweight title unification bout with Aspinall, asserting that such an amount would render results of the fight obsolete for him.
Whether or not White will give in to his demands remains to be seen, but back when the UFC President was betting on a different horse, he had traded Jones’ spot to Derrick Lewis instead. Thankfully, Lewis worked out just fine.
“We tried to work with Jon,” White had said on The Bill Simmons Podcast. “But Derrick Lewis was the guy who deserved the fight. He beat Francis, looked good recently, and was ranked in the top three”, he had added.
White also explained that the UFC model was based on pay-per-view shares, not huge guaranteed payouts. “That’s how you run a business and don’t go broke,” he had proudly claimed.
Tensions grew further after UFC 260, when White joked that Jones should drop to 185 after seeing Ngannou’s second-round KO of Stipe Miocic to regain the title.
Jones later hit back at the bossman and claimed never to have asked for that number.
Jones calls out White’s ‘lies’
Jones made it clear he wasn’t happy with how White had been reshaping the narrative in his story. So he jumped on social media to deal with the $30 million rumor first.
“I never discussed wanting $30 million with you or Hunter,” he wrote, calling out the UFC president directly. “Just wondering where you heard that number? Is someone speaking with you on my behalf or…”, tweeted Jones.
I never discussed wanting 30 million with you or Hunter @danawhite just wondering where you heard that number? Is someone speaking with you on my behalf or…
— Jonny Meat (@JonnyBones) April 23, 2021
Jones’ post sparked another wave of tension between him and the UFC brass. At the time, he had already asked for his release from the promotion, clearly frustrated with how negotiations were being handled, further aggravated by an alleged witch-hunt.
Despite the fallout, fans remained hopeful the Ngannou vs. Jones fight would eventually come together.
But unfortunately, the Cameroonian demanded a better payscale for not just himself but also for his peers under the UFC umbrella, leading to a contract negotiation going sour and him leaving the promotion in January 2023.
The UFC would announce Jones’ debut at heavyweight a day later and pit him against interim champion Ciryl Gane for UFC 285 in March.
