Demetrious Johnson might be the best out there when it comes to fighters turned content creators. He’s very active and has got his production values down. He’s also very good with flashy titles and inquisitive thumbnails.
Recently he used his skills to present his thoughts on Tom Aspinall vacating the UFC Heavyweight title. In his video, titled This is Truly Tragic… Johnson bemoaned the fact that Aspinall — one of the better Heavyweights we’ve seen in this sport — may never fight again due to a fouls
suffered at the hands fingers of Ciryl Gane.
The former UFC Flyweight champion gave his opinion on whether he thought we would ever see Aspinall compete again.
“Logically, deep down in my gut; I would say no,” he said. “I wouldn’t risk the opportunity of me losing my vision, not being able to see my children. He could potentially lose one [eye]. I’m thinking worst case scenario.”
Johnson went on to say that he thought just a fight camp presented plenty of danger to Aspinall.
“When it comes to training, that eye is always going to be comprised,” Johnson said. “It can get scraped. [It can] get eye poked again in training. You [can] get eye-poked in fighting again. Is he willing to take that risk? I wouldn’t take that risk, but then again, Tom probably has bigger balls than me. And I’m OK with that.”
Should Aspinall make a fighting return, Johnson cautioned that opponents might be looking to target his very well-known and very exposed injury.
“Let’s say he’s fighting somebody and somebody goes, ‘I’m going to target that motherf**king eye’, which, legally they can do that.; he could potentially lose his eye,” Johnson said. “Even if his cells get rejuvenated and all that stuff, his eye is now a compromised target that, if I was fighting Tom Aspinall, I would bust that f**king eye out.”
“I’m popping that eye the entire time,” he continued.
Johnson also said it was ‘admirable’ of Aspinall to vacate his title, so as to not hold-up the division. Given that Dana White recently discussed stripping Aspinalldue to inactivity, one has to wonder whether Aspinall jumped to this decision or whether he was pushed.
With Aspinall relinquishing his belt, that means Gane — the man who caused these horrible injuries — is our new Heavyweight champion. That’s gotta sting.
