“Bones” is really back.
It’s been just about two weeks since former Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) Heavyweight Champion Jon Jones surprisingly announced that he had re-entered the drug testing pool, essentially confirming his return from retirement—a retirement that lasted only 13 days.
At the 2025 ESPYs tonight, Jones gave his first public interview since the announcement, confirming his comeback and explaining his brief retirement.
“I was retired because I felt like I had done it all in the MMA space and believed there weren’t many challenges left for me,” Jones said. “I wanted to do something beyond championships and money. Then, Donald Trump mentioned he wanted to host a fight in the White House garden.
“That seemed like an incredible opportunity,” Jones added. “I’m a very proud American and have a bunch of very close friends in the military, and this is my act of — I can’t call it service, but to be able to entertain the country and the world at this level, at the White House, it means the world to me. So, I’m back.”
Jones’ claim of no remaining challenges is laughable, if not absurd, given that undisputed champion Tom Aspinall has been waiting over a year to face him.
Nevertheless, Jones also spoke to a fan at the airport before the ESPYs, revealing his plan to fight whoever holds the title by the end of 2025.
“I would want to take on whoever’s holding the belt at the end of the year,” told Joy of Everything on TikTok. “As of right now, the champion is Tom Aspinall, but we’ll see who’s champion at the end of the year. I feel like it would be only fitting to have an American guy fight for the championship that night. I’d be willing to put it all on the line one more time.”
UFC CEO Dana White recently shared that his dream main event for the UFC White House card is Jones vs. Aspinall, which could make this matchup a reality.
That is, unless Jones ducks Aspinall again in the lead-up to this historic event.
Time will tell.
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