Is Heavyweight Champ Aspinall Losing His Cool?

UFC Heavyweight Champion Tom Aspinall has responded to the criticism he received following his no-contest at UFC 321 against Ciryl Gane in October—including the comments from Dana White. The question is: Is he losing his cool? 

Aspinall’s first defense ended in a no-contest when a double eye-poke from Gane left Tom unable to continue after the first round. The decision resulted in jeers from the crowd, while fighters such as Jon Jones suggested Tom was ‘looking for a way out.’ At the post-fight press conference, White seemed to suggest Aspinall “didn’t want” to continue, a comment interpreted as questioning the champion’s heart. Aspinall has since then been diagnosed with bilateral Brown’s Syndrome, an eye condition that hinders his ability to move the eye normally. Tom has now shut down Dana’s comments.

Aspinall Reacts

“I didn’t continue, and I’ll tell you why I didn’t continue: because I’m not a f***ing dummy. I’m not going to go out there and fight one of the best strikers in the world if I can’t see. I know, as an MMA fighter, things are going to happen in the fight that compromise you. Go back and watch my fight with Arlovski. At the end of the first round, he punched me right in the eyeball. For the rest of the fight, I couldn’t see him out of that eye.

“That’s fine. If you get punched or kicked in the eye, that’s fine. If you get double eye poked in both eyes and you’ve got no vision because of a foul, why should I carry on? So some dummy can look and say, ‘Oh yeah, Tom just got knocked out’? I ain’t going to fight if I can’t see anything because of a foul. If it’s a legal move, we have to fight through it. That’s what we do as fighters. But when it’s a foul, why am I going to put my health at risk when I cannot see at all?,” Aspinall said 

Aspinall stated that Gane was “trying to poke my eyes out all the way through that round” and that the illegal move was Gane’s intended strategy to win. This is a profound shift from the sportsmanlike approach Aspinall previously maintained, and it has drawn criticism from others, such as Ben Askren, who called the constant claims “whiny” and a “bad look.” Aspinall has publicly vowed to drop his “Mr. Nice Guy” persona and go “full bad guy” upon his return. This effort to rebrand suggests a high level of frustration, as Tom must back up his words.