Back in 2018, one of the most unexpected things in MMA history happened: the UFC traded former flyweight champion Demetrious Johnson to ONE Championship in exchange for former welterweight champion Ben Askren.

It was the first, and to this point only, trade between major MMA promotions and led to much debate among fans over who “won” the trade. And six years later, the two participants believe there’s a clear answer.

“My standpoint, I said everybody won,” Johnson told Askren on his YouTube channel. “I got to go to ONE Championship, make good money. You got to come to the UFC, get the opportunity to fight, see what you could do there. The UFC got you, which you were very good about creating buzz. Your shit-talking was actually intelligent shit-talking. You would be very good snippets. So if it wasn’t for you, they might not have the rise of Jorge Masvidal without that flying knee ... Without that flying knee you would never have Jorge Masvidal, ‘Street Jesus’ coming up, then you wouldn’t have Kamaru Usman, you wouldn’t have Leon Edwards.

“Then you look at ONE Championship, they had me, I was able to fight, I get knocked out over there to show that their competition is actually legit. Then I come back and I beat Adriano [Martins]. So I think, all in all, everybody won. What say you?”

“That’s the right answer,” Askren responded. “ONE Championship, the thing that was golden for them is I wasn’t going to fight. I was done. If you stay in the UFC, I’m assuming you’re going to continue to fight, at least for a while. And in ONE Championship, I was legit done, I wasn’t fighting anymore, so they essentially sold an asset that was off market for — you had a five-year run. I think you’ve done some grappling matches, you did a mixed-rules match, you did MMA, you did a lot of things over there.

“I think the most correct answer is everybody won. I got what I wanted, you got what you wanted.”

For Askren, the trade was entirely unexpected. A former Bellator welterweight champion, “Funky” had quietly hung up the gloves in 2017. However, he remained under contract with ONE, and as he explains it, this trade was exactly the thing that he was waiting on to bring him back.

“I’d given up the title because I retired,” Askren explained. “I said, ‘I’m out.’ So when I retired, I actually didn’t have much time left on my contract. But for me, there was no guarantee the UFC thing was going to work out because it didn’t work out the first time when I left Bellator in 2013. ...

“But I love reading about athletes and the thing I always read about athletes is they always retire too late, and they always spend too much money. So when I became a professional athlete it was like, ‘Don’t hang around too long and don’t spend too much money.’ And if you can do those things, you’re probably going to be alright.

“So I put a time limit on myself, and in ideal circumstances, I probably would have retired a little bit earlier, but I just never got the opportunity to fight in the UFC and my time in ONE Championship, they were kind of slow on fights, unfortunately. I didn’t fight for like 15 months or something like that. I wish I would have been able to fight more frequently.

“So I retired and the caveat was, I’ve never gotten to fight anyone ranked higher than me. I think the highest-ranked person I fought was No. 9 and I was No. 6. So if I could fight someone higher than me I will come back because I want that opportunity, and I left it at that.

“I never thought it would be a trade because trades don’t happen. I thought maybe ONE would sign someone really good and then I would fight that person, or something more along those lines. Or maybe they’d loan me out for something because that has happened a few times. So when Chatri [Sityodong, ONE CEO] called me and said, ‘Would you be open to a trade?’ I said, ‘Yeah, I’d be open to a trade. That’s kind of the only thing I want.’

“So for me it was simple and then I think it took a couple months to actually process it and get it done, jump through all the hurdles, but I was in right away.”

On the other hand, things were a little different for “Mighty Mouse.” As Johnson recounts, he actually initiated the entire thing because his relationship with the UFC had started to fall apart and after losing his flyweight title to Henry Cejudo at UFC 227, he wanted a change.

“I was mine and Matt [Hume, Johnson’s coach and ONE vice President]’s kind of,” Johnson said. “My whole entire career in the UFC was always, ‘You don’t sell enough pay-per-views’ or ‘We want you to go up and fight T.J. Dillashaw for a superfight’ and I’m like, I will go fight T.J. for the right money. Give me a million dollars, and I’ll fight him. What’s the point of having a superfight if there’s no incentive involved in it? ...

“I felt that if an asset isn’t bringing in enough money that it should, then they wanted to get rid of it, which I understand. So at that time they were thinking about getting rid of the division. ... So when that’s going on, it’s like, why do I want to be somewhere where I’m the cool kid at the party but nobody wants to hang out with me? Why not go somewhere where they’re going to appreciate me. So that’s what sparked that.

“Even when I lost to Henry Cejudo, I was very upset, very distraught, very pissed off. But when I got home I was like, OK, we’ve got to start thinking about what organization is going to value my skillset at the highest level? I believed that was ONE Championship and it turned out to be true. ...

“I think it was the best decision I made in my career. If I had to do it over again, I would do it 1,000 times over again.”

Johnson went on to have a very productive career in ONE, winning the promotion’s flyweight Grand Prix in 2019 and the flyweight title in 2022 before retiring this year. Askren did not fare as well in the UFC, winning his debut bout against Robbie Lawler before suffering back-to-back losses to Jorge Masvidal and Demian Maia, prompting his retirement from MMA after just one year with the promotion.

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FINAL THOUGHTS

I’m with DJ and Askren. It may be rare for trades to really be a win-win, but I really think that’s the case with this one. DJ and Askren got what they wanted, the UFC didn’t want to him anymore and got a star they did want, and ONE got what they needed. I think if you asked everyone involved they’d all happily make that trade again. — Meshew

EXIT POLL

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