My take on why Tom Aspinall has lost a lot of credibility since the Gane fight

[CroCopsLHK]

Youre not here to discuss the validity of the injury... and then thats about all you discuss?

"I've seen a lot of eye pokes like DC vs Stipe and they could continue."

Bringing up Shara Bullet as a comparison?

Gane's the type to show up to title fights?

LOL

 

[orca]

Gane won half a round then fouled out his opponent and Jones fans are acting like Tom sucks.

One double eye poke doesn’t take away the fact that Tom basically cleaned the division and finished the majority of guys at HW. Jon ran, deal with it

lmfao if tom was really that good
he could just double leg gane and finish him
evade the strikes

simple as that
captain obvious right?
why tf would you blame it to jones or jones fans for his failure

 

[Paladin]

First of all, I understand that injuries are a real part of the sport. I'm not here to discuss the validity of Aspinall's eye injuries.

I'm here to give my take on why Aspinall has lost some credibility, and also why fans are turning on him.

Fans wanted Aspinall VS Jones. People actually picked Aspinall against Jones in polls. Aspinall had a LOT of backers.
Being the UFC HW Champion means you're the baddest man on the roster regardless of weight-classes.

Obviously negotiations fell through and we didn't end up getting Aspinall VS Jones. Feels like we waited a while for it too. Had our hopes up and down.

Then, we had to settle for Aspinall VS Gane. Gane seems to be the master of showing up in HW Championship fights regardless of his poor performances.

We watched Jones make easy work of Gane... we watched Ngannou beat Gane with busted knees... and most people felt that Volkov beat Gane too.

So here Gane is, fighting the guy who we slated as the MAN to beat Jon Jones... and Gane was bloodying Aspinall up.

Now, we all know that a few minutes of 1 round doesn't determine a fight. Arlovski was getting the better of Fedor for a few minutes before going to sleep.
Hell, winning 2-3 minutes of a round doesn't even guarantee you the round, let alone the fight. You gotta win 5 minutes to win 1 round.

We got 4 minutes 30 seconds in... Gane was definitely winning but it wasn't the end of the round yet, and Aspinall ends up getting double eye-poked.
Even if Aspinall was to continue, with how bad the poke was - Gane was going to be deducted a point... which means the first round would have ended up in a draw.

But of course, Gane was getting the better of Aspinall.
The circumstances made it seem like Aspinall was looking for an out in the fight. Now, no one but Tom will know how bad it was after getting poked... and while I'm not a doctor, I have seen many fighters continue after getting poked in the eye in the same manner. Hell, I believe DC and Stipe did it to each other every fight, hah.

It didn't help that fans had been anticipating Aspinall's fight for a while. But now we had to watch him get bloodied up by a gatekeeper, and now he's not continuing in a fight due to eye poke.

So of course fans are a bit upset. Hell, If I paid thousands of dollars to to attend this fight, and I know people flew in to Abu Dhabi to watch this- man, you have every right to be pissed that the HW Championship fight ended in this manner.

But of course, we can't fault Aspinall... we can hate him for choosing not to continue with double vision against a kickboxer who was bloodying him up even when he had 2 working eyes... but ultimately it is al on Gane for the illegal blow. It didn't look very accidental either. Dude had fingers going into Tom's face. And it seemed like Gane was doing it more than once.


However, I think fans didn't expect the fight to get that far. I think we expected to see Tom bulldoze Gane the way Jones did. And when that didn't happen, we lost a bit of faith.
I mean, we picked THIS guy to beat Jones???

And since the fight, Tom and his dad hasn't really been doing themselves any favors with how they have approached the whole thing.
Again, I'm no doctor - but it doesn't seem like there's any evident damage to the eyes as far as a layman like me can understand. I know they gave some special name to what Aspinall is suffering from... and it may make sense to doctors, but it doesn't make sense to laymen like us.

Like, the Aspinalls posted the doctor's report and there doesn't seem to be something that requires immediate surgery.
But Tom and his Dad make it a point to talk about how Tom can't see yet.

Every news we get, is Tom Aspinall still can't see- and there's no timetable for his return. Now ESPN retorted that Aspniall needs surgery after all?
Apparently Tom said he already got 1 surgery, but there's no pics or anything? I'm not sure what the case is. Maybe Tom is set to get surgery.

I wish Tom the best in recovery, but the whole thing has been a mess.

No one should risk being blind. But man, it doesn't help that guys like Bisping fought with 1 eye. Bro lied to pass the medicals and even beat Rockhold on 2 week's notice when Rockhold was top3 P4P on the planet.

GSP was on a 33 round winning streak when Shields poked him and blinded him in 1 eye. GSP kept composed and won the fight 48-47... at the end he talked about how he still can't see from 1 eye. You can see GSP was scared but he kept composed enough to win the fight.

So, we have seen other Champions go through adversity and fight with 1 eye in championship fights.

Shara Bullet fights all his fights with 1 eye. He can't even get cleared in the US.

So, as far Just Bleed goes... I don't think the fans expected anything from Aspinall that we haven't seen from anyone else.

On Top of that, man... why's the BadAss HW Champion of the world so fragile- that's a thought that runs in my head too. Like man it's January now and Tom and his dad are still on about this eye injury. It's been over 2 months, let's move on. I know eye injuries are much more complicated than muscle injuries... but I don't think this does Aspinall any favors as far 'image' goes.

The HW Champion should come off as Unbeatable, as someone who would beat any man in a street fight.
Think Prime Tyson.
Think Prime Fedor.

Dudes were invincible.

Tom Aspinall seemed to have had that AURA taken away from him. And I think that's why fans have turned on Tom Aspinall.


Tl, Dr - I think fans expected Tom to muscle through the eye injury since we slated him as the MAN to beat Jon Jones. Or at the least, we expect him to get over the eye injury by now and get back to the cage to prove himself.

Agreed!

A simple statement along the lines of “ my eyes were badly Compromised during the fight. I hate I had to stop the fight. I’m seeing doctors to get treatment, I’ll be back soon” and go radio silent or don’t talk much about the eye poke. Everyone saw it was bad.

Cereal Gun is the one who screwed up yet Tom’s team took it upon themselves to keep talking about the eye poke, and needlessly justifying their correct decision to stop the fight. Anyone with eyes saw it was a gnarl my eye poke. I believe there is no need to keep talking about it because Tom and team are coming off as excuse makers.

Cereal gun is quiet and he ain’t getting a 10th of the flack he deserves because Tom and team are mismanaging their public relations and keep talking about it

 

[Mohawk Banditó]

a guy who the entire community started to consider a bum since he was effortlessly dispatched by Jones. Many people were not even looking forward to this fight since it was a presupposition that Tom would have an easy first defence to his name.

This is the biggest problem. MMA fans perceptions of anything shouldn't be trusted because they're some of the dumbest people on the planet.

Supposedly, most fans thought Gane was going to kick Jones's ass. Then he got handled, so therefore, he's a "bum."

For what it's worth, I disagreed both times. Because I saw the truth as: he's a great striker whose takedown defense was never good enough to keep the best wrestlers off of him, which isn't a difficult truth to understand, so I don't know why anyone struggles with it.

Gane isn't an easy fight for everyone, provably so since most HW's couldn't solve what is essentially a stylistic problem. A problem Tom's skillset would also have to solve, but one Jon 's skillset had no problem with.

There's also the fact people just wanted Gane to pose no problems, because he's already lost to Francis and Jon, 2 guys who didn't get conquered after, so if we want to pretend the HW champ is the best in the world, it just can't be him (not unless he showed something new), so it just pushes the perception further that he couldn't win, with the word "couldn't" primarily referring to ability, but became conflated with "couldn't win" in regards to acceptance/allowance

I barely believed in him after the first Blaydes fight. There is just this recurring theme in the guys career when things get tough. Also the wearing glasses 24/7 post eye poke is just ridiculous.

Yeah, I suspected he quit and faked that tear and surgery back then too..

 

[Superzorro]

Drunk?

Yep, that’s why people get excited when it happens, because it doesn’t happen that often. If it happened always or often like you’re suggesting, people wouldn’t learn proper form and technique in the first place. Because “you can just catch them,” right?

Most of the time when what we saw that night fully plays out, the dumb guy looks like he’s swinging at air the entire time and the more technical striker makes them look foolish.

 

[Superzorro]

This is the biggest problem. MMA fans perceptions of anything shouldn't be trusted because they're some of the dumbest people on the planet.

Supposedly, most fans thought Gane was going to kick Jones's ass. Then he got handled, so therefore, he's a "bum."

For what it's worth, I disagreed both times. Because I saw the truth as: he's a great striker whose takedown defense was never good enough to keep the best wrestlers off of him, which isn't a difficult truth to understand, so I don't know why anyone struggles with it.

Gane isn't an easy fight for everyone, provably so since most HW's couldn't solve what is essentially a stylistic problem. A problem Tom's skillset would also have to solve, but one Jon 's skillset had no problem with.

There's also the fact people just wanted Gane to pose no problems, because he's already lost to Francis and Jon, 2 guys who didn't get conquered after, so if we want to pretend the HW champ is the best in the world, it just can't be him (not unless he showed something new), so it just pushes the perception further that he couldn't win, with the word "couldn't" primarily referring to ability, but became conflated with "couldn't win" in regards to acceptance/allowance


Yeah, I suspected he quit and faked that tear and surgery back then too..

I’m going to have to stop you there, buddy. You guys were the ones saying Gane was a bum. It wasn’t until Aspinall had to fight him that we went back to him being an elite fighter and one of the best. After Jones got his hands on him, he became the worst fighter in the division with elementary school level ground game. But now he’s back to where he was before he fought Jones.

The truth? He’s average. Maybe slightly above average. Heavyweight is just not in a good place right now, so it makes it seem like he’s exceptional (you could probably argue that this part isn’t even true; he still has a lot of losses and blunders) when he’s not.

 

[Mohawk Banditó]

You guys were the ones saying Gane was a bum.

Liar at usual

Drunk?

He's gonna lecture people on what sport they're watching, and still spew MMA math bullshit. Posts aren't worth reading at this point. Evident from above

 

[Captain Herb]

Tom was already adapting and finding his range. If Tom's clean left had landed full strength at the moment Gane pushed his fingers deep into Tom'e eyes, who knows how the round would have ended. He very well could have been dropped or put on queer street. It likely could have been the first in a flurry that usually leaves opponents staring at the lights. There's a reason Gane committed the fight-ending foul at that point in the round, it's because he felt Tom closing the distance.

 

[Marko Polo]

Yep, that’s why people get excited when it happens, because it doesn’t happen that often. If it happened always or often like you’re suggesting, people wouldn’t learn proper form and technique in the first place. Because “you can just catch them,” right?

Most of the time when what we saw that night fully plays out, the dumb guy looks like he’s swinging at air the entire time and the more technical striker makes them look foolish.

I think you’re just a fan of Jon Jones who’s been tormented for the last year by Jons cowardice

 

[El Fernas]

We got 4 minutes 30 seconds in... Gane was definitely winning but it wasn't the end of the round yet, and Aspinall ends up getting double eye-poked.
Even if Aspinall was to continue, with how bad the poke was - Gane was going to be deducted a point... which means the first round would have ended up in a draw.

3 Things:

-You know very well that no one was going to deduct a point there, not a chance, its MMA, you get a free pass for a few fouls, and im not even kidding.

-Average fight time for Aspinall is around 2 minutes, this one went twice that long, if we remove the Arlovski fight that went to R2 its probably sub 2 minutes.

-TL/DR

 

[Superzorro]

I think you’re just a fan of Jon Jones who’s been tormented for the last year by Jons cowardice

You’re not making any sense. Why would that torment me? Let’s pretend you’re right and he is a coward. Wouldn’t that be exactly what I’d want as a Jones fan?

That’s the thing that gets me, you guys can’t even have conviction in your delusions. Even the lies are contradictory.

 

[Superzorro]

Liar at usual

So Jones fans were saying that the guy he beat was a bum? Not the people who were trying to downplay the win and make it seem like he didn’t do nothing at heavyweight?

You guys have to agree to start making sense when you post.

He's gonna lecture people on what sport they're watching, and still spew MMA math bullshit. Posts aren't worth reading at this point. Evident from above

Again, MMA math is right 90% of the time. When it’s not right, we call that an upset.

 

[Superzorro]

Tom was already adapting and finding his range. If Tom's clean left had landed full strength at the moment Gane pushed his fingers deep into Tom'e eyes, who knows how the round would have ended. He very well could have been dropped or put on queer street. It likely could have been the first in a flurry that usually leaves opponents staring at the lights. There's a reason Gane committed the fight-ending foul at that point in the round, it's because he felt Tom closing the distance.

So he was about to win, he just wasn’t winning yet… at all.

 

[Marko Polo]

You’re not making any sense. Why would that torment me? Let’s pretend you’re right and he is a coward. Wouldn’t that be exactly what I’d want as a Jones fan?

That’s the thing that gets me, you guys can’t even have conviction in your delusions. Even the lies are contradictory.

You’re drunk bud.

 

[Superzorro]

You’re drunk bud.

Yeah… you’re off your rocker. Get some help.

 

[Captain Herb]

So he was about to win, he just wasn’t winning yet… at all.

Certainly. Why else would Gane commit maybe the worst intentional double eye poke in UFC history? Because he felt like he was comfortably winning? We know it doesn't work like that, Just look at all Jon Jones' eye pokes. It's not an offensive foul, it's defensive--meaning the poker thinks they're in a bad spot and needs to foul. It's the same in any sport. A DB that got beat grabs the receiver's shoulder or jersey. A guard that got beat on a breakout dunk fouls from behind. A pitcher who doesn't believe he can strike out the slugger throws at his head. Gane committed such a severe foul because he he knew his time with full consciousness was limited. It was an illegal act driven by a visceral sense of desperation and impending doom.

 

[Limeade]

Should have been a win by DQ.

 

[Marko Polo]

Yeah… you’re off your rocker. Get some help.

 

[fendertach]

Certainly. Why else would Gane commit maybe the worst intentional double eye poke in UFC history? Because he felt like he was comfortably winning? We know it doesn't work like that, Just look at all Jon Jones' eye pokes. It's not an offensive foul, it's defensive--meaning the poker thinks they're in a bad spot and needs to foul. It's the same in any sport. A DB that got beat grabs the receiver's shoulder or jersey. A guard that got beat on a breakout dunk fouls from behind. A pitcher who doesn't believe he can strike out the slugger throws at his head. Gane committed such a severe foul because he he knew his time with full consciousness was limited. It was an illegal act driven by a visceral sense of desperation and impending doom.

This is how delusional Aspinall fans are. They actually believe this shit.

 

[Aluminati]

Tom’s problem is that he won’t shut up about it. Just adds more stuff to scrutinize. Could have just said he got eye poked and couldn’t see and just leave it at that.

100%. Honestly, I believe most were trolling about Tom starting to lose and looking for a way out. He was down a round and looked human, which Gane deserves credit for. After how he's responded, he deserves the shit he gets. Being a fighter and a public figure, thick skin is the expectation and he didn't even come close.