Canelo’s $150M payday vs Crawford is bigger than the ENTIRE UFC roster combined ($140M) in 2025

Its not one of the strongest periods for star power but even now they've got Poatan, Max, Izzy, Khamzat, Paddy, Ilia, Justin, Tom, Gane, Lewis, Jiri, Walker, Strickland, DDP, Merab, O'Malley, Usman, Volk, MVP, Charles, Shavkat, Khalil, Garry etc etc along with chicks like Rose and Valentina. Theres no Conor level stars but theres definitely enough to still draw interest consistently, especially when the brand itself draws too.

 

All of those fighters have different levels of drawing power and are at different stages of their career, Aspinal is the best heavyweight but he is not a star and has no competition, the Gane fight may be the only big fight he will ever have during his career, the heavyweight division is dead, Strickland is going nowhere and is becoming less relevant by the day, thug Rose is finished now, she's been in decline for a few years now, a number of the fighters you mention are in their 30's and in tyhe Autumn of their careers.

 

Aspinall is absolutely a star within the combat sports world at this point, not saying hes a household name or anything but millions of people are aware of the situation with him and Jon by now. I agree he lacks compelling competition but if he stays dominating it will offset that to some degree, as we saw in boxing with Wlad, who had very few big fights his whole career.

Things can develop quickly anyway, you can build up a new contender within a year or two pretty easily. Imagine for instance they pull a Brock on Gable Stevenson and fast track him, or they miraculously bring Ngannou back, or Jon is feeling more confident after fighting Poatan, or Poatan comes up to HW. That applies to the situation in general not just Tom and HW. Most of those names I listed have only really become known within the last few years. MMA moves very quickly.