COULD THE UFC HEAVYWEIGHT KING’S RETURN TO BOXING COME SOONER RATHER THAN LATER?
Tom Aspinall — one of the nicest guys in combat sports but, without doubt, one of the most deadly.
The 6’5” man mountain makes the first defence of his UFC Heavyweight Championship in Abu Dhabi this weekend against Frenchman Ciryl Gane — but could the Lancashire lad be set for a return to boxing in the near future?
A talent born in his dad’s shed, Aspinall first took up Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu as a youngster under the tutelage of his father, Andy, before eventually trying his hand at MMA.
When fights became hard to come by for Aspinall due to the fact he was so good, he turned his hand to boxing.
Trained by one of the best in the business, Peter Fury, he made his professional boxing debut in 2017 at the age of 24 — in what turned out to be his only professional boxing contest to date.
A first-round KO of Tamas Bajzath showed his talent on his feet was evident from the start.
He returned to MMA and, since then, he’s taken the world by storm.
With a record of 15 wins and three losses, he’s yet to see the third round in the UFC — seven of his eight wins have come in the first round, with his only other victory coming in the second against the experienced Andrei Arlovski.
So, with him now the ‘Baddest Man on the Planet’ and defending his heavyweight title this weekend, why could he be considering a return to boxing?
Well, there are multiple reasons.
First off, it’s the current depth of the UFC heavyweight division.
The two biggest dangers to Aspinall — Alex Pereira and Jon Jones — aren’t even active in the heavyweight division at the moment, and both have steered clear of talk regarding a potential fight with Aspinall, appearing far more open to fighting each other.
When you look down the UFC heavyweight rankings right now, Aspinall has stopped five of the top ten ranked fighters in the division — all in the first round.
Aside from Gane, Jailton Almeida is the highest-ranked fighter Aspinall hasn’t beaten, but he suffered a KO loss to Curtis Blaydes — the man Aspinall obliterated inside a round in his last fight.
Next up is Waldo Cortes-Acosta, ranked sixth, but again, he’s been beaten by Sergey Pavlovich — a man Aspinall has a first-round stoppage win over.
So really, on paper, there’s no one of major threat to Aspinall — no opponent who can truly motivate him to get out of bed and train every day, or one from whom he can make a substantial amount of money.
That is, unless Jon Jones or Alex Pereira have a change of heart and want a piece of the Aspinall cake.
The next reason is his close friend Ante Delija, who is slowly working his way up the rankings.
He stopped Marcin Tybura on his UFC debut last month, and Aspinall has already said he’s prepared to vacate the heavyweight title if it meant Delija had a shot at it.
The third reason is money.
He’s seen the likes of Francis Ngannou and Conor McGregor cross over to boxing and make eight-figure sums from a single fight.
To earn that kind of money in the UFC is simply unrealistic due to its pay structure — so if he wants to earn that sort of coin (which we’re sure he does), he’ll almost certainly have to switch to boxing.
So, who would he fight if he did decide to step into the squared circle?
The obvious opponent is Francis Ngannou — hard-hitting former UFC heavyweight champ versus hard-hitting current UFC champ.
There’d be a ridiculous amount of money in it and, let’s be honest, it’s virtually guaranteed not to go past the first round.
He could also, like Ngannou did, look towards a huge name in boxing and take that route.
The likes of Anthony Joshua, Derek Chisora, and — dare we say it — even Jake Paul would surely appeal to Aspinall. He’s a friend and former training partner of Tyson Fury, so you can pretty much put a line through Fury’s name.
How realistic those three names are is another question — but it’s certainly not something you’d rule out.
What the future holds for Aspinall is uncertain, but in a perfect world, he’d cement his legacy as one of the greatest fighters of all time in the UFC with a mega-fight against either Jon Jones or Alex Pereira — or even both.
If, as it appears right now, neither of those fights materialises and if Aspinall beats Gane this weekend, dipping his toe back into the world of boxing may well be one of the smartest career moves big Tom ever makes, especially with UFC President Dana White now launching Zuffa Boxing.