The build-up to UFC 309 seemed to be dominated by a fighter who wasn’t even competing in Madison Square Garden on Saturday night. In the weeks leading up to the event the majority of the discourse surrounding the heavyweight title fight at the top of the card focused not on how the bout between Jon Jones and Stipe Miocic would play out, but rather on the debate over whether interim champion Tom Aspinall should have been the one challenging for the belt.
Once fight week rolled around, Jon Jones seemed to pull the pin out of that grenade by labelling Aspinall “an a**hole” while speaking to the media and all hell broke loose from that point on.