Dana White says Tom Aspinall is backup fighter for UFC 309, responds to Jon Jones retirement talk

Dana White and Jon Jones | Photo by Jeff Bottari/Zuffa LLC via Getty Images

Tom Aspinall will be at UFC 309, so says UFC CEO Dana White.

Over the weekend, the UFC officially announced UFC 309 will be headlined by a heavyweight title fight between Jon Jones and former champion Stipe Miocic. It’s a bout well over a year in the making and after hearing the news, interim heavyweight champion Tom Aspinall made his case for serving as the backup fighter for the matchup. And apparently White agrees.

On Tuesday, the latest episode of Contender Series took place in Las Vegas and afterward, White spoke to reporters where he confirmed that Aspinall will get his wish for UFC 309.

“Yes,” White said when asked about Aspinall serving as backup. “Tom Aspinall is next in line for anything that happens after this fight.”

Of course, being the backup fighter does not necessarily guarantee Aspinall will get a shot at the undisputed belt if something happens to either Jones or Miocic before the event. After all, Jones and Miocic were first scheduled to face each other at UFC 295, with Sergei Pavlovich serving as backup fighter, but when Jones sustained an injury, the promotion postponed the bout entirely and called Aspinall to step in on short notice against Pavlovich for the interim title.

Hopefully nothing similar will happen this time, however, even if they fight does go through, Aspinall may not get his “dream fight” against Jones afterward as the heavyweight champion recently declared UFC 309 will “more than likely” be the final fight of his career. That flies in direct opposition to White’s previous contention that he believes Jones will fight Aspinall should he beat Miocic, but for now, White says he can’t worry about that.

“Why speak to him after this event?” White said when asked about Jones’s comments. “You’ve got to figure out what’s going to happen in this fight. See how this fight plays out and then we’ll go from there.”

UFC 309 takes place on Nov. 16 at Madison Square Garden in New York City.