Tom Aspinall and Dana White are on the same page when it comes to a prospective fight with Jon Jones.
It’s no secret that Aspinall has been hunting for a fight with Jones, the UFC’s current heavyweight champion. Aspinall has carried the title of interim heavyweight champion since November 2023 and actually defended his belt before Jones did, but after Jones defended his share of the heavyweight crown against Stipe Miocic at UFC 309, Jones expressed little interest in unifying the belts.
White disagreed with Jones, telling the media after UFC 309 “If Jon Jones wants to fight again after Saturday night, he will fight Tom Aspinall.” In an interview with Piers Morgan, Aspinall confirmed that the UFC CEO told him the same thing shortly after he stepped away from the post-event scrum.
“That took place, that interview, right after the Jones fight the same night,” Aspinall said. “Actually, right after that press conference, I had a meeting with Dana. ... I hadn’t seen any of the stuff that he said, so in all honesty, I was expecting to come and maybe negotiate a little bit. He literally walks into the room and said, ‘It’s happening.’
“And I said, ‘Well, he’s going to want loads of money.’
“And he said, ‘I know, but it’s happening. And it’s going to be the biggest fight in UFC history.’”
Jones has been cool on the idea of fighting Aspinall, claiming that Aspinall’s credentials aren’t enough for him to earn a unification bout—Jones is 28-1 (1 NC) as a pro with his lone loss being via disqualification, but is just 2-0 at heavyweight while Aspinall is 8-1 in the division—and that he’d like “f*ck you money” to sign on for an opponent for whom he has great disdain.
Aspinall is confident White will put together the cash to make it happen.
“I would imagine so,” Aspinall said when asked if White can meet Jones’ demands. “I can’t speak for Dana, but I would imagine so.”
“Obviously, I’ve got a family, I want to make as much money as I can,” Aspinall continued. “But to me, what’s more important is unifying the belts. See, in MMA it’s a little bit different to boxing in the aspect of you have different weight divisions, which is very like boxing, of course. But usually, you have one champion, one face, one name of every division. Now in the heavyweight division right now there’s two and I don’t want there to be two because I feel like I’m the No. 1. Jon obviously feels like he’s the No. 1 and let’s fight about it. It’s not that difficult.
“Jon often likes to talk about legacy and his history and all this stuff. It’s not about Jon, it’s about the belt and I want to be the unified champion, so for me it’s not so much about money.”
Though Aspinall has had fun with the fan sentiment that Jones is ducking him, he acknowledges that Jones is far more about the bottom line than he is wary of the threat Aspinall possesses.
“No, he’s trying to get more money,” Aspinall said. “I don’t think he is ducking me. He’s trying to get more money.”
“I actually agree with a lot of what Jon says,” he added. “When you put the résumés next to each other, his résumé is far superior to mine. The risk-reward for the both of us, his risk is he has everything to lose. ... Like I said, I completely agree with everything that he says in terms of résumé, but it’s not about Jon’s résumé, it’s about who’s the best in the world right now and I think it’s me.”
