England’s Tom Aspinall said he wishes Jon Jones well in retirement and that his only disappointment of the past year is that he wasn’t officially able to fight for the UFC’s undisputed heavyweight title that is now his.
Aspinall (15-3) became the undisputed champ last Saturday, when UFC CEO Dana White announced that Jones (28-1) had retired from mixed martial arts. After winning the interim title in November 2023, Aspinall had been waiting for a potential unification bout against Jones to materialize. He even made the rare move of defending his interim title in his most recent appearance in July 2024.
Ultimately, Jones, 37, elected to walk away from the sport rather than accept a bout with Aspinall.
In an interview with ESPN this week, Aspinall acknowledged he wished Jones would have stuck around “from a selfish perspective,” but said he doesn’t hold Jones’ retirement against him as much as he wanted the fight to happen. He said he has always viewed himself as the champion anyway and is glad that the situation with Jones is “in the past and we can move on.”
“I’ve said it a million times: I was never actually chasing Jon, I was chasing the heavyweight title,” Aspinall said. “Don’t get me wrong, Jon Jones would have been an amazing scalp to have on my record, but the opponent standing across from me never mattered. It has never mattered, and it never will matter. What was important to me was being the best in the world. The other stuff was pretty irrelevant. As I said, it would have been a great scalp that would have propelled me more than any other fight, but a fight’s a fight. I’m not too bothered.”
Aspinall added: “I don’t know [Jones]. I don’t know him personally. I know he’s got his own struggles at the moment. Whatever he has going on in his life, I wish him the best of luck. What he’s saying on social media and in interviews is that he feels he’s done enough. So if he feels like that and he can be content with that, then God bless him, and I wish him the best for the rest of his life.”
Earlier this month, Jones, who is widely considered the greatest fighter of all time, was charged with leaving the scene of an accident in Albuquerque, New Mexico, in February. He is scheduled to appear in court next month. The misdemeanor charge is the latest in a string of legal issues that have entangled Jones throughout his career.
With Jones officially retired, Aspinall, 32, is expected to defend his heavyweight crown in the near future. He said he still hopes to fight twice this year despite having nothing official on the books.
“There’s one coming,” Aspinall said of his next fight. “It’s going to be soon. I want to fight twice this year. Absolutely I see that [happening].”
