Tom Aspinall believes the current state of the UFC heavyweight division resembles boxing.
Interim champion Aspinall (14-3 MMA, 7-1 UFC) is eager to unify his belt with undisputed champ Jon Jones, but with UFC CEO Dana White insisting on rebooking Jones vs. Stipe Miocic, Aspinall won’t get his wish.
With Jones (27-1 MMA, 21-1 UFC) currently sidelined because of a torn pectoral muscle, Aspinall will have to wait a while before getting to unify the belts, and that frustrates him. He just wants the opportunity to prove he’s the best.
“I absolutely love the sport of MMA, UFC in particular,” Aspinall said on the “True Geordie” podcast. “I’m so proud to be fighting for the best MMA organization in the world. What that represents for me is the best fighting the best. And I’m a massive boxing fan, I absolutely love the sport of boxing, (but) I f*cking can’t stand the boxing model. There should not be five, six different world champions at one weight. … Let’s find out who the f*cking guy is. That’s what I want to find out. There’s two champions right now in the UFC heavyweight division. That’s not right.
“You can sugarcoat it all you want, these legacy fights and whatever. My next fight has to be for the undisputed title. Why would they do otherwise. Let’s f*cking find out who the guy is, simple as that. All this legacy fight sh*t, I don’t understand how that can happen. Yeah, let them have a legacy fight, but why for the undisputed title? Why are you making the rest of us wait? I understand it’s Jon Jones. There’s no person walking this earth who is a bigger Jon Jones fan than me, but this isn’t boxing. This isn’t guys avoiding each other. This isn’t the No. 1 guy fighting the No. 10 guy. Let’s find out who the f*cking guy is, because I believe it’s me.”
White said Aspinall can defend his interim title if he’s open to it. But Aspinall isn’t even addressing that possibility and can’t fathom the current title picture.
“It’s very odd, and obviously I don’t want to sit here slagging off my bosses, but it’s not right,” Aspinall said. “They can’t be two f*cking heavyweight champions. It can’t be. This isn’t boxing. There’s one guy, one face, one name, and let’s find out who that is.”
