Jon Anik would prefer divisional meritocracy, and the result of the upcoming Jon Jones vs. Stipe Miocic heavyweight title fight could muddy the waters even more.

Jones and Miocic headline Saturday’s UFC 309 pay-per-view card with Jones putting his title on the line for the first time. Since Jones’ octagon absence, Tom Aspinall has won and defended the interim heavyweight title — historically suggesting that he should be next in line for a shot to unify the titles.

While the fan base would love to see Jones face Aspinall, “Bones” has continued to no-sell Aspinall, and instead focused his attention on planting seeds for a champ vs. champ fight with light heavyweight title holder Alex Pereira. Anik was asked about the situation days away from the promotion’s return to Madison Square Garden.

“Well, certainly it stands to reason that Alex ‘Poatan’ may be the bigger money fight,” Anik told MMA Fighting. “It may not be the fight that has the greater fan appetite, but maybe it is. ‘Poatan’ versus Jon Jones is absolutely enormous, right? But there are a lot of us that operate as true, die hard sports fans in a meritocracy in our brains and just doesn’t sit well with this interim champion who has already defended the title idling or sitting pat, especially when you look at how good Tom Aspinall is across every aspect of mixed martial arts.

“But what is Jon Jones’ net worth? What is Stipe Miocic’s net worth? What if your financial advisor might tell you you need to retire — because I can assure you I’m not retiring — in terms of what you actually need? And so Jon Jones fighting Tom Aspinall or Alex, what does he make? $15 million? Is that worth it? Is that worth risking the 0? I don’t know, but if Jon Jones is worth $25-$30 million and it stands to reason, there are a lot of opportunities for him to make money beyond fighting, I don’t know. If you were his manager, would you tell him to risk the O and legacy because he should fight Tom, because Tom’s got the interim belt and Tom’s the f*cking man? I don’t know that you do that.

“You can be sure… well, I shouldn’t say this, but I would submit to you that for Dana White and Hunter Campbell, they would much rather make a Jon Jones-Tom Aspinall fight than inject Alex ‘Poatan into’ the equation. But Jon Jones does have status as the greatest mixed martial arts athlete of all time,. so if he wants to fight ‘Poatan,’ I’d imagine, promotionally, you would listen.”

Anik will call the action with Joe Rogan and Daniel Cormier — who has had multiple fights with both headliners over his hall of fame career — and understands why Miocic is a massive underdog in the former champ’s first fight in nearly four years.

But what if Miocic goes into The World’s Most Famous Arena and regains the heavyweight title? Anik understands how surprising that could be for a lot of fight fans to see, but also believes that if the Cleveland native pulls this off, perhaps he’d stick around to give Aspinall is opportunity to beat a legend of the game.

“This is the fight game, right? I mean, Belal Muhammad now has a life-threatening injury, and had that happened during his training camp for Leon Edwards, he probably never gets that undisputed championship opportunity,” Anik said. “So, yes, it’s crazy to sort of think about the prospects for Tom Aspinall, no matter who wins this fight. I will say to you if Stipe Miocic wins this fight — and you have me thinking about how I would cap it, were he to do so — but if Stipe Miocic wins this fight, I think he will fight Tom Aspinall. And if it’s a relatively quick fight, maybe in short order to try to realize that payday, I wouldn’t be surprised at all to see Stipe want to make one title defense against Tom Aspinall and then ride off into the sunset.

“But I don’t know without having sat down with these individuals and if you think Stipe is going to be wicked forthcoming, then you’ve never met the man, so we’ll see how it all plays out.

“I just feel pretty convicted in saying that Tom Aspinall is going to realize financial freedom for his family, hopefully for generation, and just needs his opportunity. But man, it’s a tough world for a lot of these fighters. When you get very close to the top, sometimes you have to wait forever and sometimes you feel like it’s never going to come.”

Regardless of the result, and how things may go on Saturday night in the Big Apple, one thing is for sure: This fight can’t happen soon enough to get the heavyweight division, hopefully, moving in the right direction.

As Anik things about how things can play out, he has a tough time truly grasping how both guys can look after significant layoffs.

“Well, I don’t try to get too predictive in some part because I am a play-by-play announcer, but how do you really predict what you’re gonna see out of both of these athletes?,” Anik said. “The sample size for Jon Jones at heavyweight is small, and Stipe Miocic last competed against Francis Ngannou when he was 38 and he is now 42 years of age.

“Now, one thing I can tell you with sitting down with Stipe in a fighter meeting is that he’s done everything in his power to have the best cardiovascular base possible and put himself in the best position to win this fight. I do think it stands to reason if the fight is contested early on the feet that Stipe can land some shots and look better than whatever the betting line suggests he is. I mean, I was talking to some of my contemporaries, I think two years ago when this fight was first inked and I was like, ‘Man, Stipe a +290 against any man?’ And they’re just like, ‘Dude, he’s fighting Jon Jones who is not any man,’ and I guess that is true.

“And so I think Stipe at 42 is not like a handicapper’s dream, but what kind of training camp has preceded this fight for Stipe? What kind of training camp has Jon Jones had? I can’t wait to sit down with these two individuals in the fighter meeting. But yes, this fight needs to happen in the worst possible way. We need Nov. 16. We need clarity and finality and a result when it comes to these two absolute legends.”

The UFC is back in New York for UFC 309, and the popular “Embedded” fight week video series is here to document what’s happening behind the scenes.

UFC 309 (pay-per-view, ESPNews/Hulu/FX, ESPN+) takes place Saturday at Madison Square Garden in New York.

In the headliner, heavyweight champion Jon Jones (27-1 MMA, 21-1 UFC) puts his title on the line for the first time when he takes on former champ Stipe Miocic (20-4 MMA, 14-4 UFC) in a fight delayed by a year. In the co-feature, former lightweight champ Charles Oliveira (34-10 MMA, 22-10 UFC) takes on Michael Chandler (23-8 MMA, 2-3 UFC) after he was left at the altar by Conor McGregor.

The second episode of “Embedded” follows the featured fighters while they get ready for fight week. Here is the UFC’s description of the episode from YouTube:

Champ Jon Jones has lunch; Charles Oliveira gets a haircut and tends to his farm; Michael Chandler arrives in New York and trains; Stipe Miocic has a recovery session; Chris Weidman plays poker with his friends.

Previous UFC 309 ‘Embedded’ episodes

For more on the card, visit MMA Junkie’s event hub for UFC 309.

(This story was updated to add new information.)

The UFC has the U.K. circled on the calendar as part of its first-quarter international schedule in 2025.

The promotion announced that a UFC Fight Night event will take place March 22 at The O2 in London. No bouts were included with the announcement.

Lightweight contender Renato Moicano wasted no time calling for a UFC London main event between himself and Paddy Pimblett on X. The two have gone back-and-forth about a potential fight in recent weeks.

UFC London Main event !? Moicano vs pimblett!? What do you guys think !? #mma #ufc #ufclondon

— Renato Moicano UFC (@moicanoufc) November 12, 2024

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Unlike UFC 304 in Manchester, which had a 3 a.m. local (10 p.m. ET) main card following the traditional start times for U.S. pay-per-views, this Fight Night event will happen in prime time locally.

UFC 304 last July at the Co-op Live saw Belal Muhammad dethrone Leon Edwards to become welterweight champion in the main event. In the night’s co-headliner, Tom Aspinall retained his interim heavyweight title by avenging his loss to Curtis Blaydes in a first-round TKO win. Fan favorite Pimblett also picked up his biggest UFC win to date, submitting King Green in the first round to earn a $200,000 bonus.

Given March 22 is a Fight Night event, it’s unlikely to be as stacked as UFC 304.

THE HERD WITH COLIN COWHERD

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Daniel Cormier is set to call the UFC 309 main event where two of his greatest rivals meet with the heavyweight title on the line.

Jon Jones returns to action to face Stipe Miocic in a long-awaited showdown between two all-time greats to cap off the event from Madison Square Garden in New York. The fight was originally scheduled for November 2023 but Jones suffered a torn pectoral muscle that delayed the fight for a year.

While Cormier is no stranger to calling fights involving some of his former opponents, Saturday’s main event is particularly interesting considering Jones and Miocic were arguably the toughest challenges he faced during his Hall of Fame career. He faced them a combined five times during his career so Cormier certainly knows Jones and Miocic better than most.

Cormier is joined on the broadcast by play-by-plan man Jon Anik and comedian/podcaster Joe Rogan as the three-man booth calling UFC 309.

Megan Olivi is set to serve as the in-arena reporter for the event with Din Thomas providing analysis throughout the event.

UFC officials confirmed the broadcast team to MMA Fighting on Tuesday. MMA Junkie was the first to break the news.

UFC 309 also features a five-round co-main event when former lightweight champion Charles Oliveira takes on Michael Chandler in a rematch. In their previous encounter, Oliviera survived a near finish in the opening round and then put Chandler away in the second round to claim the vacant 155-pound title.

Now they meet again just over three years later with the winner almost certainly jumping right back into title contention in the lightweight division.

The UFC 309 pay-per-view main card kicks off at 10 p.m. ET with the prelims set to begin at 6 p.m. ET with 13 total fights scheduled from New York.

(Editor’s note: This story originally published on Nov. 12, 2018.)

To those who bought the pay-per-view and took the ride on Nov. 12, 1993, it must have seemed like a wild gamble. Here was this brand new event, the Ultimate Fighting Championship, which claimed that it would deliver “no rules” fights between a hodgepodge of various martial arts masters until only one champion remained.

Also the fights would take place in an eight-sided cage, and football great Jim Brown would be there for some reason, so why not call up your cable company (pretty much the only way to order a pay-per-view event back then) and take your chances?

Still, savvy viewers must have had questions. At a time when most viewers had to choose between boxing and WWF pro wrestling as their only pay-per-view options in the combat sports realm, what were the odds that this would be a legitimate contest? And if it did mean to deliver exactly what it promised – trained martial artists beating each other in a cage until someone quit or lost consciousness – would it even be allowed on TV?

But then the time came and there it was, a broadcast from the McNichols Sports Arena in Denver that opened with karate champ Bill “Superfoot” Wallace incorrectly identifying it as the Ultimate Fighting Challenge – right before he burped on live TV.

The fact that they’d even made it to fight night was a relief to the event’s organizers. As explained in the excellent 30 for 30 podcast, “No Rules – The Birth of the UFC,” a disagreement at the rules meeting threatened to derail the entire event. According to several sources, it was only when sumo wrestler Teila Tuli signed his agreement and informed his colleagues that he “came to party” that the other fighters fell in line.

Tuli was the first man to make the walk on the broadcast that night, facing Dutch savate champion Gerard Gordeau in the opening round. Gordeau had reportedly whiled away the time backstage by smoking cigarettes and casting menacing stares at his fellow fighters. When he got his chance in the cage against the 420-pound Tuli, it took him just 26 seconds to sidestep Tuli’s bull rush, topple him to the mat, and then kick him directly in the mouth.

The commentators later joked about Tuli’s tooth flying out of the cage and landing somewhere under the broadcast table. What they didn’t realize until later was that another one of his teeth was embedded in Gordeau’s foot, where it would stay until he returned home to the Netherlands and got it removed.

The swift, violent end to the fight was something of a wake-up call. For one, it demonstrated just how serious these fights could get, and just how quickly someone could get hurt. It was also something of a shocking visual. A large man being kicked in the face as he sat on the ground? That wasn’t the kind of thing you saw every day.

Then there was the confusion after the kick. The bout was stopped almost immediately, but at first it appeared as though Tuli might get a quick check from the doctor and be allowed to continue. But as modern MMA fans know, that’s not how it works. Once you stop a bout in a moment like that, you’ve irrevocably changed it.

This is how Tuli’s night ended early, and how the UFC’s first tournament bout ended with a protested stoppage.

If fighters were shook up by seeing the level of human carnage possible in this form of fighting, they didn’t show it. In the next bout, Zane Frazier started fast against Kevin Rosier, battering him against the fence before running out of gas in the thin Denver air and eventually collapsing on the mat, earning himself a couple head stomps before his corner finally threw the towel.

Next came Royce Gracie, the chosen representative of the family that played an instrumental role in putting the event together. Royce was far from the most ferocious member of the Gracie clan, which was kind of the point. One of the goals of this event was to showcase the power of Gracie jiu-jitsu as a martial arts discipline. If the family had chosen Rickson Gracie, a pitbull of a man with a physique seemingly carved out of marble, viewers may have attributed his success to athleticism and other natural gifts rather than the art form itself.

Royce, on the other hand, was skinny and shaggy-headed, looking more like a surf bum than a world champion fighter. If he could stand alone among this tournament of monstrous men, the thinking went, it would really prove something.

Royce Gracie and Ken Shamrock at UFC 1. (Holly Stein-Getty Images)

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Gracie didn’t exactly face the toughest test in the opening round. Art Jimmerson, a mid-level boxer who chose to wear one glove on his lead hand, ostensibly in order to leave the other free for grabbing and grappling, clearly did not know what he was in for. After being taken down and then easily mounted by Gracie, he tapped out before he could even be placed in a submission hold. The ground game seemed to be just that foreign to him.

The biggest potential challenge to Gracie came in the form of Ken Shamrock, a heavily muscled and intensely angry man who by then had already begun making a name for himself on the mixed rules fighting scene in Japan. Like Gracie, Shamrock knew a thing or two about submissions. As he demonstrated in his opening-round bout against Patrick Smith, his specialty was leg locks – especially the heel hook.

But after a quick and fiery win over Smith, Shamrock was submitted with even greater speed by Gracie, who managed to use his gi sleeve to add leverage to a sort of modified bulldog choke in the opening minute of the bout. Shamrock tapped, prompting Gracie to release him, even if the referee missed it. This prompted Gracie to angrily insist that Shamrock admit to tapping out, which he did, with a somewhat surprising graciousness.

With Gordeau easily downing Rosier via strikes, the finals were set. But lest anyone get confused about the limits of impartiality, the event also saw a pause to honor the martial arts contributions of Helio Gracie, the patriarch of the Gracie family.

Royce Gracie holds his $50,000 check after winning UFC 1. ( Markus Boesch-Getty Images)

Maybe then it shouldn’t have been such a surprise to see Royce take Gordeau down, move to his back, and then finish him with a rear-naked choke in the finals. This was always the end that the event organizers envisioned, after all. And as a method of spreading the gospel of jiu-jitsu, it worked remarkably well. The tournament produced the desired visual, with the physically unimpressive Gracie jiu-jitsu fighter conquering a series of larger, more intimidating foes until he alone stood as the winner of the $50,000 grand prize.

Just as importantly, the tournament itself had gone surprisingly well. No one was seriously maimed or unreasonably injured, as it seemed early on that they very well might be. While the broadcast had its share of hiccups (and one burp), viewers were mostly too glued to the unusual action to care.

What was pitched as a bloody, barely legal curiosity suddenly started to seem like a potentially viable new entity. There might be a future in this after all. But as the crowd filtered out of the McNichols Sports Arena and the fighters headed for the hotel bar, no one could have possibly known just how much it would grow and change in the next quarter-century. Back then, who could have even guessed it would last so long?

“Today in MMA History” is an MMAjunkie series created in association with MMA History Today, the social media outlet dedicated to reliving “a daily journey through our sport’s history.”