It’s been nearly a year since Tom Aspinall last stepped inside the Octagon.
Aspinall (15-3 MMA, 8-1 UFC) has held the UFC interim heavyweight title since knocking out Sergei Pavlovich in November 2023. He last fought in July 2024 at UFC 304, where he stopped Curtis Blaydes and avenged the only loss of his UFC career.
The British contender has been patiently waiting for a chance to face reigning heavyweight champion Jon Jones (28-1 MMA, 22-1 UFC) in a title unification bout. However, one former UFC welterweight believes Aspinall should stop waiting on “Bones” and get back to doing what he does best — fighting.
Matt Brown (24-19 MMA, 17-13 UFC), who retired in 2023 after making 30 UFC appearances, compared Aspinall’s situation to that of Michael Chandler, who spent nearly two years sidelined waiting for a fight with Conor McGregor — a matchup that ultimately never materialized.
“I look at that just like the (Michael) Chandler situation with Conor (McGregor). Just go fight, bro,” Brown said on The Fighter vs. The Writer podcast. “Keep your name out there. Keep showing that you are the man to fight him. Keep building your legacy. Keep your name out in the news. Keep showing the world that you the guy that should be fighting him.
“If it’s true, then your case is going to get stronger and stronger. If you’re sitting on the sidelines, it doesn’t really help your case as much.”
While Brown understands why Aspinall is holding out for the fight with Jones, he believes the interim champion may come to regret being so patient once his career is behind him.
“I just come from a different school (of thought),” Brown explained. “Maybe it’s an old school thing just me personally, when I was fighting or what I would suggest for others to do is go ahead and fight as much as you can, fight the best guys you can and see how things work out. That’s not always the best way to go about business and necessarily the best way to make money but look you only live once. You’re going to (look back) at 50 or 60 years old, retired and be like ‘that whole year I was out or the two years I was out, I wish I would have fought.’ I think about stuff like that.
“That’s why I would advise something like that but I totally get the business side, too. You’ve got to get the biggest fight you can and not take all the risk to get there necessarily.
“They’re not going to strip (Jones) either,” Brown said. “I wish there was just a rule set in stone. Like if you don’t defend in this amount of time, you’re stripped. That’s the way it should be. Unfortunately, it’s just up to the PR guys and Dana (White) and I’m sure they sit down and have meetings and talk about it. There’s just no standard. No guidelines.
“We’re all living in the UFC’s world and it just kind of goes the way they want it to go. You could make an argument either way whether he should be stripped or not but it’s like ultimately the UFC just decides. The argument is almost irrelevant.”
