It appears Dana White has given Jon Jones a deadline to decide on the fight with Tom Aspinall.
UFC officials have been attempting to arrange a matchup between the heavyweight champion and the interim titleholder since November.
White and the promotion even agreed to offer Jones a significantly large sum, described as “F**K YOU MONEY,” for the major unification fight.
The 37-year-old Jones reportedly accepted the multi-million-pound offer but has publicly considered retirement.
White remains hopeful about finalizing the fight but emphasizes the UFC won`t wait indefinitely for Jones to decide.
Speaking on The Jim Rome Show, the 55-year-old stated, “We`ll see how this thing plays out over the next couple of weeks. If we can`t get this fight done, we`ll move on quickly. We`ll have answers in the next couple weeks.”
White maintains that the delay in scheduling this potentially historic heavyweight bout is not because Jones is avoiding the Wigan fighter Aspinall.
The UFC`s CEO and President also commented, “Jon Jones has never, ever said, `I`m afraid to fight this guy.` Or, `I don`t like this fight for me,` or any of that stuff. One time, his coach at the time… I think it`s the only fight we`ve ever cancelled. I had to cancel a show because he wouldn`t fight Chael Sonnen… But it had nothing to do with Jon Jones. Jon Jones has never turned down an opponent here or been afraid to fight anybody.”
For months, White had expressed confidence that Jones would agree to face Aspinall in a fight SunSport understands is still aimed for November.
However, it became clear last week that his certainty about the fight had diminished when he admitted, “You can’t make people fight.”
“If Jon doesn’t want to fight, you can’t make him fight.”
“We can try to make him fight, we can throw things at him that inspire him to want to fight. But we’ll figure it out.”
Jones, a former pound-for-pound great, has not competed since defending his heavyweight title against Stipe Miocic at UFC 309 last November.
Meanwhile, Aspinall has been inactive since his swift 60-second defense of the interim title against Curtis Blaydes at UFC 304 in July.