Media Aspinall's defense is porous and little more than just backing up.

Idk about backing up but he does rely on the lean back a lot and it's worrying, but so far nobody catches him. Mostly he's hard to hit back because he enters at angles, gets his head off-centre while punching and is so quick and short with his boxing that he'll hit the opponent before they can fully throw. But occasionally he'll be leaning back and moving his head away from punches that way.

He's sparring regularly with the likes of Rico Verhoeven and Tyson Fury and lighting up fighters in the UFC who are ahead of Eddie Hall.

These clips are all with him starting the near the fence already, only a step or two away from it. Very easy to be backed up from there. When is he ever actually that near the cage in his fights?

Also from the video there's no way of knowing what they're drilling. Maybe they're drilling getting off the fence with the back to it. Maybe they're drilling for Eddie to practice stopping someone from circling off.
 
Tom would have knocked him out standing.

It's annoying for a power puncher to fight guys who they would ko clean in a real fight to have to turn down your power to give them a chance.
 
AndrewGolota48 said:
Can't fight forever, if he didn't have the hunger anymore then 15 years at the top is enough that he doesn't owe anything. Champ since 23, wins a second belt at HW, retired undefeated at 38, sounds all good to me.
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And ruined his legacy by ducking literally the first serious challenge he faced
 
Tom has admitted he has horrible defense and needed to work on it, this was a year and a half ago. The dude only has like 7 minutes or less of fight video, its possible he still does not know how to control the adrenaline in the cage maybe.
MMAMidwit said:
Truth hurts. The amount of damage Blaydes had taken leading into the Aspinall rematch is astronomical. Even in wins he was taking damage. And Pavlovich had a good streak but he looked pretty bad in every single fight since Aspinall.

I don't think you actually watch fights.
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I mean trying to make the argument that Tom actually sucks is like a really hard challenge, I kind of respect you for trying.
 
Ares Black said:
And ruined his legacy by ducking literally the first serious challenge he faced
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Jones basically pulled a GSP. Went up and fought a favorable champion with zero intention of fighting the more difficult matchups in the division. Only difference is at least Jones defended the belt which optically looked worse but is actually a bigger accomplishment. It's just that Jones is such an unlikeable dickhead who couldn't articulate his resistance to fighting Aspinall properly.

GSP gets zero flak for coming out of retirement to fight Bisping when everybody knew there was ZERO chance he was going to fight Rockhold, Weidman, Jacare, or Romero.
 
MMAMidwit said:
Jones basically pulled a GSP. Went up and fought a favorable champion with zero intention of fighting the more difficult matchups in the division. Only difference is at least Jones defended the belt which optically looked worse but is actually a bigger accomplishment. It's just that Jones is such an unlikeable dickhead who couldn't articulate his resistance to fighting Aspinall properly.

GSP gets zero flak for coming out of retirement to fight Bisping when everybody knew there was ZERO chance he was going to fight Rockhold, Weidman, Jacare, or Romero.
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GSP didn't hold up the division for two years while taunting Robert Whitaker on social media
 
Ares Black said:
GSP didn't hold up the division for two years while taunting Robert Whitaker on social media
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If Jones had a shred of honor or decency he wouldn't have done that but practically-speaking that is entirely the UFC's fault. They should have stripped him. Jones just did the rational (extremely selfish) thing which is to carry on like he's the undisputed champ and make money that way because the UFC enabled it.
 
MMAMidwit said:
I think he got a declining Blaydes and Pavlovich has proven to be a bit overrated. I don't understand why he's such an overwhelming favorite against Gane. People seem to have forgotten about Gane's fight against Spivac after Ngannou and Jones. Spivac is a really good grappler and was even getting the better of Jailton Almeida until he wilted like always does.

People just hate Jon Jones so much that they can't forgive Gane for getting smoked and they want to discredit Jones so bad that they have to pretend Gane is a white belt and completely clueless when it comes to grappling.
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Yep, I think Aspinall is good, but definitely some people are wearing Jones-hater shades on with how much they describe Gane sucking and Aspinall being perfect. Both guys are ahead of the rest of the HW division by alot, but fans/haters could be a little more objective. The only 2 takedowns Aspinall has defended in the UFC was a 10 day notice Spivac in the first round.

People forget Gane was 10-0 with the interim belt after beating Lewis, never been taken down despite everyone knowing he was a french kickboxer. He had tons of fans on sherdog. He's only lost to champs and no one who has beat him is still in the UFC (well maybe Jones is or isn't).


Aspinall has only taken down Arlovski, Volkov, and Baudot. Go ahead if you want to argue those guys are very difficult to takedown and prove he had great wrestling.
 
MMAMidwit said:
GSP gets zero flak for coming out of retirement to fight Bisping when everybody knew there was ZERO chance he was going to fight Rockhold, Weidman, Jacare, or Romero.
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That's not true. GSP took a lot of shit, and this still comes up.

Jones' attempt was so shameful, dragging a zombie out of it's grave, and balling on it, then quitting when a challenge came, and still asking to be booked- It's made Georges' MW run much more romantic and respectable to a lot of people.
 
Luthien said:
Sounds like 84% of the current HW/s @HI SCOTT NEWMAN 🐈
6edb5346c3a171a653f7c199a3b76dad026623e8_2_690x362.jpeg
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In brighter news I wonder what new 'breaking news' clothes lines Tom will be putting out for christmas, wonder what it'll be this time 😹
 
SuperNerd said:
That's not true. GSP took a lot of shit, and this still comes up.

Jones' attempt was so shameful, dragging a zombie out of it's grave, and balling on it, then quitting when a challenge came, and still asking to be booked- It's made Georges' MW run much more romantic and respectable to a lot of people.
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Fair enough on GSP.

I agree that Jones' HW "championship run" has been a complete farce. He didn't beat the lineal champ and ducked Ngannou when he was around. I don't think it does much to diminish his GOAT status though because his LHW resume speaks for itself. And I can't bring myself to hate on Jones too much when the UFC itself doesn't respect the integrity of the sport, doesn't give two shits about fighters, and fans (not hardcores who are a minority) will ridicule fighters for getting knocked out and hurt and will retcon legendary careers based on late-career losses.

In my opinion, the only person that Jones truly disrespected and fucked over was Aspinall. Screw the fans and screw the UFC.
 
He’s been training with Rico, who’s basically the top kickboxer in the world for a lil while now so I have a feeling his striking will just look better and better but we’ll see.
 
Kevster said:
As opposed to Gane needing an absolute gift to avoid a loss to Volkov.
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Gane was obviously dealing with an injury and still won. You may as well say Blaydes and Aspinall are 1-1 then if you don't take any other factors into account.

Gane 50-45'd Volkov the first time they fought, for a reason....and Gane was the much greener fighter of the two back then so if anything it further proves the injury was limiting Gane considerably.
 
Come to think of it, I don't actually recall Aspinal moving straight back. I do recall him moving side to side all the time though and showing great footwork.
 
AndrewGolota48 said:
Can't fight forever, if he didn't have the hunger anymore then 15 years at the top is enough that he doesn't owe anything. Champ since 23, wins a second belt at HW, retired undefeated at 38, sounds all good to me.
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Should have just called it quits right away then, right after Stipe. Rather than playing games in the media, accepting the fight and then moving back and back and the finally chickening out.
 
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