Jon Jones sounds like he really doesn’t want to fight Tom Aspinall.
But everybody has a price.
The 37-year-old, who successfully defended his UFC heavyweight title Saturday night against Stipe Miocic at the Garden, has said he does not like Aspinall, who won the interim heavyweight title last year when the initial Jones-Miocic fight was called off due to Jones’ pectoral injury.
“He’s annoying to me and that’s my own personal — he annoys me,” Jones said after Saturday’s win of Aspinall, who has taunted Jones for not facing him. “I get to you guys, you find it entertaining, but I find him annoying and I just don’t like him and at the end of the day, if I give him the opportunity to fight me, I want to be so compensated — I want to say it, I want that ‘f–k you’ money, honestly. That’s just what it is.”
While Jones didn’t specify exactly how much money he’s looking for, he did say he’d be looking for a “very, very high number.”
“I want to be compensated to the point where if I won or lost, that it really wouldn’t matter,” Jones said.
Dana White said during a pre-fight press conference on Thursday that the winner of the Jones-Miocic fight should go on to face Aspinall in a title unification bout.
Jones, however, has said his preference is to face Alex Pereira, the current UFC light heavyweight champion.
“I don’t need [Aspinall] at all and he needs me and that’s a good place to be in a negotiation,” Jones said.
When White was told Saturday night that Jones wanted to be highly compensated for a fight against Aspinall, White responded, “he will be.”
Miocic, the 42-year-old former heavyweight champ, said after the fight that he’s retiring.
