As fans continue to wait for any news of a showdown between UFC heavyweight champion Jon Jones and interim champ Tom Aspinall, the Brit has declared himself “undisputed heavyweight champion of the world.” That declaration was based on Aspinall’s other claim: that Jones was now retired.
“Jon’s retired,” Aspinall said on “Good Guy/Bad Guy.” “What are you talking about? You guys don’t follow Jon on social media? The guy is living his best life. He’s had a fantastic career, we all know. We know Jon’s a religious man, so I want to say God bless him moving forward, what he does in his life and his career, and we move on. We move on. I’m the undisputed heavyweight champion of the world. I’m ready to take on all comers, get this division moving again. Us guys have been waiting around too long. The guys, contenders are getting sick of it, everybody’s getting sick of it, even the fans are getting sick of it. Jon’s retired and it’s time that we move on.”
Having held the title for more than 820 days, Jones is creeping up on the record for longest heavyweight championship reign in UFC history. Of course, that’s a somewhat dubious record as Jones made his long-awaited jump to the heavyweight division in March 2023, winning the title that was left vacant when Francis Ngannou left the promotion. Jones has only defended the belt once, beating a faded version of Stipe Miocic in November 2024.
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Cain Velasquez holds the current record for longest heavyweight title reign at 896 days and successfully defended his title twice in that time.
Meanwhile, Aspinall is the longest-reigning interim champion in UFC history at 570 days, having won the title in November 2023 and successfully defending it in July 2024.
Lately, Jones has been in Thailand filming a reality show. He addressed the situation at a recent seminar in the country and hinted that a deal could be in place.
“The UFC, I and Tom, we all got a lot of stuff happening behind the scenes,” Jones said. “They’re one of the biggest organizations in sports and right now Tom and I have agreed to wait for the UFC to make their announcements. So I legally can’t really talk about it.”
Despite that, Aspinall suggested during his “Good Guy/Bad Guy” appearance that he no longer cared about a fight with Jones and was only concerned with being undisputed champion and fighting on an active schedule.
“I’m not looking to fight Jon Jones,” Aspinall said. “I’m looking to fight for the undisputed heavyweight championship. That’s what I want to be. I want to be the UFC undisputed heavyweight champion. I see a lot of people comparing me to Michael Chandler. Michael Chandler waited for a long time for Conor McGregor. I’m not waiting for one fight. I’m not trying to fight one guy. I’m trying to fight all the guys. I’m trying to be the guy at heavyweight who takes out everybody.
“It doesn’t matter who it is. Ciryl Gane, Volkov rematch, Almeida, Derrick Lewis, Brock Lesnar, whoever it is, I don’t care. I want to fight everybody, and I want to fight as much as possible, get some excitement back in this division. Let’s not talk about Jon Jones anymore. All the best, the guy’s living his best life. Full respect to him, wish him all the best in the future. He deserves all the money and success that he gets. I’m the active guy, I’m going to fight somebody, and that’s going to be announced pretty soon.”
