What’s at stake for the stars of UFC 309?

NEW YORK — It has taken an awfully long time to get to this point.

A heavyweight title clash between Jon Jones and Stipe Miocic was first announced in July 2023. But Jones blew out his shoulder and had surgery, postponing it for over a year, which stalled a division and several careers in the process. Saturday, they will finally meet.

Meanwhile, Michael Chandler and Charles Oliveira first fought in a 2021 slugfest that swung wildly back-and-forth for the five minutes and change that it lasted. They’ve each taken tough, setback losses to lightweight contenders since. Saturday, they will finally reacquaint themselves.

Oliveira will be fighting for the first time in seven months. Jones, for the first time in 20. Chandler will be making the walk for the first time in two years. Miocic, for the first time in three-and-a-half.

Legacies, potential retirements, GOAT statuses, the futures of top contenders in two marquee divisions — it’s all in flux depending on Saturday’s results. Such meaningful outcomes ought to make this night worth the wait. Here’s what’s at stake for all involved at UFC 309.

If this Saturday wasn’t happening and Jones never fought again, he’d still go down as a Mount Rushmore UFC fighter and one of a select few who could be considered the greatest to ever compete in the sport.

UFC’s youngest champion, its eighth fighter to win belts in multiple divisions, the company record holder in title-fight victories and longest unbeaten streak. You can challenge Jones’s behaviour outside the octagon a million and one ways — but there’s no disputing what he’s done inside of it.

So, in a way, a victory over Miocic would be superfluous. Particularly considering Miocic is 42, last won during Donald Trump’s first term, and well past his prime as one of UFC’s most dominant heavyweight champions.

But Jones is betting that context will slowly fade as time wears on. That should he win, those looking back on his career in 20 or 30 years will see only a green “W” next to his bout with Miocic, an all-time great heavyweight. That they’ll marvel at such an accomplishment over a decade-and-a-half into Jones’s UFC run.

This is why he’s spent all week talking about only being interested in legacy fights against accomplished, name brand veterans — not litmus tests against the current best in their primes.

“After this many years with this company and all the work that I’ve put in, I believe I’m at a place where I deserve to be able to say I don’t want to fight that guy. I want to fight this guy,” Jones said this week. “I don’t feel like I need the heavyweight championship of the world. I feel like what I’ve created for myself is almost bigger than belts.”

If he wins Saturday, Jones will have beaten the best of his era in the sport’s two heaviest weight classes. That the timing and circumstances were strongly in his favour will be merely a footnote. Just as the stains from his myriad early-career transgressions are seldom talked about today. Only the most fervent fans will consider the context. The vast majority won’t.

“I have belts and I have money and all that type of stuff,” Jones said. “I’m looking for the legacy stuff. Tom [Aspinall] doesn’t give that to me. He has hype. I could shut up hype. But I’ve been doing that my whole life — shutting up hype. Now, I want legacy. That’s what I want.”

Stipe Miocic: Serendipity

Given his age, inactivity, and performance in his most recent fight, you won’t find many folks favouring Miocic on Saturday. Never mind the fact he’s fighting one of the most accomplished athletes in UFC history and likely at a distinct disadvantage if the fight goes to the ground.

But every round begins on the feet, and to be a heavyweight is to be only a clean shot away from flipping a fight on its head. One mistimed slip, one ineffective parry, one bite on a feint. With fighters this big who throw this hard, a slight opening can produce a sizable result.

“That definitely plays into the fight,” Miocic said. “It’s definitely a different ballgame when it comes to heavyweight. You’ve got bigger guys, they hit harder. A lot of things are different. We’ll see. I have some things up my sleeve, too, just like he does.

The brilliance of Miocic’s six-fight heavyweight win streak during his first title run was that he was nimble enough to avoid those untimely outcomes against monstrous strikers such as Mark Hunt, Alistair Overeem, and Francis Ngannou in their first fight, in which Miocic spent a nerve-wracking opening three minutes evading sledgehammers from all directions.

But Miocic’s number finally came up in his next title defence, when Daniel Cormier caught him with a perfect shot to the jaw from the clench, handing him only the second knockout of his career. Miocic was heavily favoured in that fight due to advantages in size, speed, and power. But Cormier found that one serendipitous heavyweight shot he needed.

And that’s the most foreseeable fashion in which Miocic could beat Jones. He’s ranging from a +400 to +500 underdog. But it only takes one shot in a heavyweight fight. And if Miocic can find it against Jones on Saturday, he can walk away from the sport a three-time champion who did something no one else could against a pound-for-pound great. In this sport, in this division, it’s not such a far-fetched outcome.

Michael Chandler: Relevancy

Out of sight and out of mind for the last two years, Chandler sacrificed a great deal in pursuit of the life-changing payday that would come with a Conor McGregor fight. Ultimately, his patience and persistence only served to waste a chunk of the 38-year-old’s precious career clock and halt the momentum he’d built with a blitzkrieg five-fight stretch over his first two years with UFC.

A McGregor fight may still materialize sometime in 2025. But for now, Chandler needs to get back in the octagon, deliver another memorable performance — win or lose — to remind fans of the highly entertaining style he brings to his fights, and begin maximizing his few remaining opportunities to cash fight purses.

“Patience is a virtue, right? It is one of the most important attributes that we can have as human beings,” Chandler said. “Yet, sometimes when you flex that extreme patience muscle, people question it.”

Chandler’s an explosive, go-for-broke fighter — an approach that may not age well as he nears his 40th birthday. He’s already bucked that convention by churning out banger after banger since his UFC arrival at 35. But he’s also been knocked down three times in his last four fights, and there remains every reason to doubt how sustainable his gun-slinging approach will be going forward.

If Chandler beats Oliveira, he positions himself as part of the conversation for a crack at the lightweight belt, which Islam Makhachev will defend against Arman Tsarukyan in January, while keeping the window open to finally fight McGregor at 170. If he loses, it’ll be a fourth in his last five — all against lightweight contenders. That could force him up to 170 regardless of whether the McGregor fight’s there or not.

The best he could hope for in the latter scenario is that Saturday’s fight with Oliveira is as thrilling as the first time they met. That would preserve his status as one of the sport’s better bets to produce fireworks. It would allow him to spin off into any number of fun action fights to run out his UFC contract, whether it’s a rematch with Justin Gaethje, a wild-vs-wild clash with Dan Hooker, or a welcoming of Max Holloway to the lightweight division.

This fight isn’t without risk, of course. If Chandler suffers a major injury at 38, it could threaten his career. But sitting on the sidelines for years awaiting a fight that may never come was threatening his career, as well.

“I don’t want to be off from November all the way to June, July, whenever it may be. I just spent two years on the sidelines,” Chandler said. “I don’t believe this whole age thing. I don’t believe in ring rust. I feel 25. I feel the most dangerous I ever have been. But the clock is always ticking. And I don’t like to waste time.”

Charles Oliviera: Directionality

Things move fast in MMA. Only 12 months ago, Oliveira was booked for a rematch with Makhachev for UFC’s lightweight title after he was submitted by the Dagestani champion a year prior. But he was forced to pull out of the fight due to injury, then dropped a split decision in a razor-thin battle with Tsarukyan at UFC 300, ceding his position as the division’s No. 1 contender.

Now, Oliveira emerges from a wake of what if’s — what if Oliveira didn’t get injured prior to the Makhachev fight; what if he had finished one of the two deeply sunk submissions he had Tsarukyan trapped in during their fight — needing to make a statement merely to maintain his standing in the division and avoid losing three of four against top lightweight contenders.

Another loss would leave Oliviera with few avenues back to a title shot at 155, and could force him back down to featherweight, where he suffered several misses on the scales earlier in his career, or up to welterweight where his excellent jiu-jitsu and submission ability could help overcome any size disadvantages.

If Oliviera beats Chandler? That keeps the lightweight door open for a long-speculated clash with Hooker or a rematch with Gaethje. Earn another win over one — or possibly both — of those two and Oliviera can make a more legitimate case for another crack at Tsarukyan or Makhachev.

“A fighter wants to be a champion. That’s what we want. You want the title,” Oliveira said. “So, I’ll tell you what — I’m not looking for Arman, I’m not looking for Islam. I’m looking for who has a title. Whenever they go at it, I will be there first row watching it. And whoever has that belt, that’s the person I want to get.”

Perhaps no one has been more eagerly anticipating Saturday’s fights than Aspinall. And he’ll be a curious spectator just like the rest of us.

Based on merit, activity, and public sentiment, Aspinal is already the UFC’s unofficial heavyweight champion. Over the last three years, he has wins against five of the nine ranked heavyweights that join him to form the division’s top 10: Alexander Volkov, Sergei Pavlovich, Curtis Blaydes, Serghei Spivac, and Marcin Tybura.

Jones? He has one win over a currently ranked heavyweight: Cyril Gane, whom he beat for the vacant title in his most recent fight 20 months ago.

Miocic? he hasn’t beaten any heavyweights in the UFC’s top 15. He doesn’t even have a fight against an active UFC athlete. His last octagon win came in 2020 against Daniel Cormier, currently a 45-year-old commentator who will be calling Saturday’s fights.

Meanwhile, Aspinall has nine heavyweight fights since 2020 — seven of them first-round victories, and five of them within the fight’s opening two minutes. His only loss in that span came when he blew out his knee 15 seconds into a fight with Curtis Blaydes. Two years later, Aspinall avenged that loss by stopping Blaydes within a minute.

The only thing preventing Aspinall from being officially crowned this division’s champion has been the repeated hold-ups in getting Jones and Miocic into an octagon. In the time since the Jones-Miocic fight was first announced, Aspinall has won an interim title over Pavlovich, defended it against Blaydes (only the third time an interim title has been defended in UFC history), and lobbied for fights against both Jones and Miocic to no avail.

But Saturday, Aspinal’s 14-month wait should finally reach a conclusion, and his next step ought to become clearer. He’ll be next in line to fight whomever wins Saturday’s main event. And if both fighters retire, his interim belt could simply be converted into the actual title, or he could be the A side of a future fight for the vacant championship.

The lone remaining disaster scenario is a cruel twist of MMA weirdness that opens the possibility of Jones-Miocic being rebooked — a last-second withdrawal, a draw on the scorecards, an early injury stoppage, a disqualification.

But barring the bizarre and unforeseen, Aspinall stands to be the biggest winner of all Saturday. Because the UFC’s most deserving heavyweight should finally gain a path forward to a belt that, for all intents and purposes, already has his name on it.