UFC 295 took a major hit when Jon Jones suffered an injury that cancelled his scheduled matchup against Stipe Miocic but former foe Daniel Cormier believes the fight that replaced them may actually provide a more entertaining affair.
With Jones out, the UFC scrambled to make an interim heavyweight title fight that will pit Sergei Pavlovich against Tom Aspinall in the new co-main event on Saturday. While Pavlovich and Aspinall definitely don’t have the same name value as Jones or Miocic, Cormier argues that it’s still a potentially better fight just because those two are at their peak right now.
He can’t say for certain that would be the case with Jones vs. Miocic, especially by the time they would actually meet in 2024.
“For me the purist, I’m like we may be getting a better, more competitive fight between two dudes in their absolute prime,” Cormier told MMA Fighting about Pavlovich vs. Aspinall. “Because while Jones is still in his prime but Stipe at 41, I don’t know. I talk to him a lot, I talk to Stipe. I don’t know how he’s training but I know at 41 when I was getting ready to fight him, I felt the difference.
“So I don’t know if he feels the difference and at 42 by the time they do fight next year, you’ve got to be feeling a bit of a difference or you’re Randy Couture and nobody’s Randy Couture.”
Because Cormier experienced his own struggles at times fighting past 40, he can’t help but wonder what Miocic will look like after a three year long layoff at 42.
“I wish I saw those guys with Stipe in his mid 30s, Jones in his late 20s,” Cormier said. “We’re a business, I get it. It’s a massive fight on name value alone and they will perform. It’s going to be a tremendous fight but I like this new [co-main event].”
Pavlovich enters his interim title fight off six straight wins — all by knockout — without a single opponent making it past the first round. His last three performances all came against ranked opposition as he dispatched Derrick Lewis, Tai Tuivasa and Curtis Blaydes in rapid-fire fashion while spending less than five total minutes combined in the cage.
Seeing the kind of power that Pavlovich generates with his punches reminds Cormier of another knockout artist who also held UFC heavyweight gold not that long ago.
“I have seen Sergei Pavlovich become an absolute monster,” Cormier said. “He is knocking guys out in a way that we haven’t seen since Francis [Ngannou]. Nobody just puts people out like him and Francis, Derrick Lewis obviously, too. Boom, boom, boom, you’re gone.”
His last outing against Blaydes was particularly telling because it was the first time Pavlovich faced a high level wrestler who could potentially nullify his power by taking the fight to the ground.
Instead, Pavlovich shrugged off Blaydes’ attempts to drag him to the canvas before delivering a stunning knockout, which ultimately earned him the opportunity to compete for the interim title at UFC 295.
“Curtis Blaydes’ takedown attempts weren’t great because they couldn’t be,” Cormier explained. “He was scared. He was literally scared because he felt the power of Sergei Pavlovich. Dude’s a monster.”
As for Aspinall, he boasts a 6-1 record in the UFC including wins over Alexander Volkov, Marcin Tybura and Serghei Spivac. He’s only gone to the second round once since joining the UFC roster and apparently he’s also received very high praise from another legend ahead of his fight on Saturday.
“The way [Michael] Bisping talks about Tom Aspinall, this kid must be the greatest mixed martial artist at heavyweight that he’s ever seen,” Cormier said. “Because I have never seen Michael Bisping talk about someone in such glowing terms and I trust Michael Bisping.
“I trust Michael Bisping, I trust his ability to see something special and if he’s telling me how special this dude is and I know what Pavlovich is and these dudes got to fight for the belt? I’m all in.”
