SUMMARY
- Tom Aspinall states that fighting Curtis Blaydes, Stipe Miocic, and Jon Jones are his top three legacy fights.
- The interim champion claims he chose to fight Blaydes in July because he deserves a title shot over Ciryl Gane.
We’ve witnessed a multitude of changes over the last year or so in the UFC. Amongst it all, Tom Aspinall saw himself becoming the UFC Interim Heavyweight Champion of the world. Since then, he’s been looking forward to either a title unification matchup or to defending his belt against other ranked opponents.
Obviously, a unification matchup with Jon Jones is on the table but it couldn’t happen since Aspinall got his hands raised at UFC 295 because the champion tore his pectoral muscle. Jones was also scheduled to fight at UFC 295 to defend his title against the greatest heavyweight of all time, Stipe Miocic. But it was the injury that kept him away from competing in the octagon.
The UFC Heavyweight Interim Champ wants either Jon Jones or Stipe Miocic after UFC 304
While the champ prepares to make his return later this year (hopefully), Tom Aspinall was assigned to defend his interim title against the No.4 ranked Curtis Blaydes. With his first title defense just over a month away, Aspinall recently got interviewed by MMA Junkie during which he revealed three of his ideal legacy fights.
“I want to fight anybody. I’m not one of them guys who’s picky but obviously the number one, number two, [and] number three would be Blaydes, Stipe, and Jon Jones. They’re the main three guys and then we start branching out into others. But the top three people that I’m interested in fighting are them three guys,” he said.
While fights against Jones and Blaydes are inevitable, Aspinall might have to wait a while before he gets booked to compete against Stipe. He last fought against former UFC Heavyweight Champion Francis Ngannou and lost via a second-round knockout.
Tom Aspinall reveals what made him want to put the interim title on the line against Curtis Blaydes
Tom Aspinall was supposed to fight the No.2 ranked contender Ciryl Gane, however, this fight never fell through for unknown reasons. Instead, Aspinall had accepted to give Blaydes a shot at UFC gold, someone who hasn’t had too many title fights unlike Gane, who fought Ngannou and Jones for the belt.
Aspinall said, “I always like leaning into some fight more than others. And I wanted to fight Blaydes because I technically have lost to Blaydes. I feel like he deserves a title shot as well over Gane at this point. I wanted to fight Blaydes because we got history together,” he said.
He stated that the UFC tried to push for a fight against Gane but he felt like Blaydes was more worthy of a title fight because of the history they have against each other. During a UFC Fight Night event in July 2022, Aspinall lost to Blaydes after a mid-fight injury. Aspinall has since defeated Sergei Pavlovich for the interim title, who had also eliminated Blaydes in the past.