Jon Jones is widely considered one of the greatest fighters in the history of combat sports, but his legacy won’t suddenly come into question if he retires before facing off with interim UFC heavyweight champion Tom Aspinall.
That’s according to Matt Brown, who has long argued that Jones earned the right to call his shot after spending the better part of the past 16 years running roughshod over anybody and everybody UFC threw at him. Jones is currently preparing for a showdown against Stipe Miocic, with all signs pointing toward a November date at UFC 309 in New York.
Meanwhile, Aspinall has ratcheted up his attempts to lure Jones into a fight instead after capturing the interim heavyweight title in 2023 and then defending it with a knockout of Curtis Blaydes. Of course, Brown understands Aspinall’s desire for that fight, but he believes the narrative that Jones is somehow avoiding Aspinall won’t last long enough to really matter.
“The fact is, it will be forgotten,” Brown said on The Fighter vs. The Writer. “No matter what Tom does. If Jon retires after he beats Stipe, we’re in the age of news is news for a day. Maybe for a day or two, there will be some people on Reddit saying Jon was scared of Tom or whatever.
“By next week or whatever … he’ll still be the greatest ever. No one’s going to be like, ‘Oh, Jon’s not the greatest ever because he didn’t fight Tom Aspinall.’ I don’t think a single person’s going to say that. They’re just going to talk a little bit of silly stuff for a couple of days and it will be completely forgotten. Just like [Georges St-Pierre].”
While not exactly the same situation, St-Pierre returned from a long hiatus and beat Michael Bisping to become undisputed UFC middleweight champion back in 2017. There were immediate expectations that St-Pierre would then move on to fight interim champion Robert Whittaker, who sat dormant upon winning his title several months earlier.
Instead, just 34 days after beating Bisping, St-Pierre relinquished the title due to health issues and never returned to compete again. Even dealing with a truncated timeline compared to Jones, who has been out of action for over a year due to a torn pectoral muscle, St-Pierre was never called coward because he didn’t get to unify the belts in a fight against Whittaker.
“Next week, it was all forgotten,” Brown said. “I didn’t even remember that he turned down to fight Robert Whittaker. I didn’t even remember that being talked about at the time. I was deep in the sport at that point.
“It’s just one of those things where everybody loves to put their own little opinions on things for a day or two, and it’s forgotten about the next day.”
Aspinall can certainly keep pushing for the Jones fight to happen, and that only raises his profile as he continues to call himself the real UFC heavyweight champion. Aspinall may even have a valid argument that he’s already the best heavyweight on the UFC roster, but Brown knows that never seemed like a goal Jones was chasing anyway.
“Correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t remember Jon ever saying, ‘I’m out here now to try to be the greatest heavyweight,’” Brown said. “He’s like, ‘I’m the greatest fighter, I got that in the bag. I’m the greatest fighter of all-time. I’m going to fight a couple heavyweight fights. Yeah, I might be a little bit picky about who I fight. I’m the greatest fighter of all-time, bitch. I get to pick my fights now.’
“I don’t remember him ever saying, ‘I’m out here to attempt to prove I can also be the greatest heavyweight.’ He’s like, ‘No, I’m moving up to get a couple paydays, getting some big fights, having some fun, not have to cut weight, and move on with my life.’”
Whether Jones dismantles Miocic in November or not, Brown admits his opinion of the former light heavyweight champion won’t really change.
There are other reasons why Jones may have tainted his legacy through past actions, but Brown expects that Aspinall is ultimately nothing more than a small blip on the radar and a distraction that won’t last forever.
“He’s the greatest,” Brown said of Jones. “The only debate about whether he’s the greatest or not is when you talk about the banned substances. That’s literally the only argument you have against it. I don’t think there’s any other argument. We all know Jon is the greatest of all-time.”
Hard to bet against Jones against anyone. I’d love to have seen Aspinall vs Ngannou.
Jon is betting against himself against Aspinall. That would be the biggest money fight in his career and he’s running scared.
Jones doesn’t need Bob Aspilalt for nothing. Bob needs Jon bad though.
Should Jon defeat Stipe, UFC would offer him the biggest payday of his career to fight Aspinall and yet he won’t even entertain the fight. Why do you think that is?
Because he’s negotiating for even more money. Essentially walking away from the deal so they will make a better offer.
GSP > Jones
That would great but I seriously doubt Jon will fight Aspinall. He didn’t sign to fight in the UFC at HW for 3 years until the day Francis left and literally thanked God when Rumble left the LHW division. Time will tell.
Aspinal is on a 3 fight win streak. Thats it. Lol. Jones has a 23 fight win streak just in UFC alone. Hes won 16 straight title fights. Aspinal has won 2 title fights.
Aspinal wouldn’t even be in the top 15 fighters that jones has beat.
That’s kind of misleading there. Aspinall’s only loss in 9 fights in the UFC HW division came by way of injuring himself against Blaydes, who he knocked out in the rematch in the first round.
So Tom has 8 wins (all finishes) at HW in the UFC and Jon has 1.
Jon arguably lost his 2 last fights at LHW against Reyes and Santos and was gifted a decision against Reyes.
Even Dana who is now sucking Jon’s dick thinks so.
LHW =/= HW
Jones just had one of his most dominant wins ever at HW.
Bruh he took down someone wilth white belt grappling and subbed them. Cherry picked.
How do you think he’ll look against old man Stipe?
Excellent.
With all the failed drug tests, ped failed tests, and eye poking every single fight, I can not consider Jones even in the top 10.
I know most will disagree but most fighters would do just as amazing if they were allowed to eye poke their opponents eyes a few times every fight just like Jones does. Add in all the times he failed ped tests. It actually amazes me how accepting the general mma fans are of Jones cheating. Fighters had to fight Jones with the worry of their eyes being damaged, that is far from normal.
Context matters young James