On Wednesday, the champion of the heavyweight division, Jon Jones, gave fans an update on his status. Jones has not fought since knocking Stipe Miocic out at UFC 309 last November. Fans and even UFC president, Dana White, had hoped that his next fight would be against Tom Aspinall, but it seems Jones may have unofficially retired. 

The 37-year-old made this known via Twitter while answering a question on how it feels to be retired. Whether or not the question was sarcastic or not intended to be taken seriously is unknown, but Jones gave his reply. 

He wrote: “I don’t know if I wanna call it retired, I feel like I’ll always have an ability to pop out and show ’em. I’ve had many breaks throughout my career, my identity outside of fighting is well intact. I’m genuinely enjoying life, I’m growing in different ways.”

While his reply does not directly say he’s retired, the fact that he did not deny it totally is troubling for some fans who have been looking forward to Jones vs. Aspinall. Jones has always made it known that he was not interested in the bout, as he does not believe Aspinall to be a worthy opponent. This has, however, not stopped fans from putting all their hopes that it would be the next heavyweight championship fixture in the franchise. 

Even Dana White is among those who want the fight to happen, and as recently as just a few days ago, he maintained, in a post on X, that Jones vs. Aspinall was going to happen. Jones’ recent update might change his position… or not. 

Although Jones did not confirm whether he was retired, one thing he got right was he had always taken breaks throughout his career. Before facing Ciryl Gane in 2023, his last fight was in 2020. And it took him quite over a year after that to face Miocic. 

This just means that, true to his word, we may see him in the octagon again defending his title. But the puzzle remains whether Aspinall will be the other man in the cage with him.