UFC 304: Can Aspinall entice Jon Jones with a win over Blaydes?

Yahoo Sports MMA contributor Ben Fowlkes previews UFC 304 and how Tom Aspinall vs. Curtis Blaydes could entice Jon Jones to stick around a little longer.

Video Transcript

Ben folks here for Yahoo Sports, we got UFC 304 going down out in Manchester this weekend.

A lot to like about this fight card as a whole.

The thing that I'm most looking forward to, I think here is the heavyweight comment event between interim heavyweight champion, Tom Aspinall and Curtis Blades.

Now, obviously, these two guys, they have a history.

They fought once before, but uh we didn't learn anything from it.

They went in there for about 15 seconds.

Aspinall blew out his knee on the first kick, he threw this time.

Stakes are much higher.

It's not just because of the interim title that Aspinall has either.

It's because we're all looking at John Jones as the actual UFC heavyweight champion and thinking once he gets that fight against ST a Mio in the fall, he might not stick around that longer.

So Aspinall seems like he very well could be the future of the division and it's easy to get excited about this guy, big guy athletic, he can move.

He has knockout power knows at least a few submissions.

So all that together at heavyweight.

Sure, we get excited about it is he, that guy though, he's only had eight fights in the UFC.

You're looking at a string of mostly first round finishes in which we just don't get to see that much out of him.

Curtis Blades, he's the kind of guy with a, a wrestling game that's really well adapted to M MA a good ground and pound game.

If you're not that person yet, if you're not at that level, Curtis Blades is gonna find out there could be a lot of fans stumbling out of that arena at six or seven on Sunday morning with some broken hearts.

But if Aspinall is that guy, if he goes out there and he starches Curtis Blades the way he has done to a bunch of other people, honestly, I think those calls for Jon Jones to stick around at least long enough to face Aspinal for the unified heavyweight title.

Those are just gonna get louder and louder.