How Dire Is The UFC’s Heavyweight Situation, Really?

Once upon a time, heavyweight was considered the UFC’s premier division. The likes of Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira, Andrei Arlovski, Tim Sylvia, Frank Mir, Brock Lesnar, and even Randy Couture dominated the 2000s. The 2010s introduced fans to Cain Velasquez, Junior Dos Santos, Fabricio Werdum, and Stipe Miocic.

Those were glorious days, but the division has purportedly become a shell of itself in the 2020s. The current champion, Tom Aspinall, is currently recovering from double eye surgery, and Yahoo’s Petesy Carroll recently gave this harrowing update on his condition:

“Nearly four months later, (Aspinall) still can’t track moving targets. His eyes hurt if he sends too many text messages. He gets vertigo if he changes directions suddenly. He misses people’s hands when he tries to shake them. He can no longer do the thing that’s given him an identity since he was a child. Hell, he struggles to do the most basic drills. Sometimes, he struggles to play with his kids. He has to ask people to drive him to most places he goes and ask those same people to bring him home afterward.”

It is not just Aspinall, however. Several other factors have contributed to the rapid decline of the division.

Bad Fighters

It is often said that men who have the size to be heavyweight fighters in MMA tend to gravitate towards other sports. This is, for the most part, true. After all, why will one toil for what amount to peanuts in the regional circuit when he can immediately earn six figures on an NFL team’s practice squad? Barring that, he can join WWE and become a star while taking less debilitating damage, since professional wrestling is as much about coordination as it is about action.

While there have been outliers, like Eryk Anders and the much-maligned Greg Hardy, the trend has largely held true. That has led to some bizarre fighters debuting in the octagon, like Braxton Smith, who was signed despite a complete lack of combat sports experience. He lasted just a single fight, a TKO loss to Parker Porter, before being cut.