I'm as happy as anyone to bask in the brilliant 2024 MotoGP title fight, but I can't help thinking how 2025 and its biggest storyline has been ruined somewhat in the process.
As a neutral it was great to see Jorge Martin prove the doubters wrong and beat a factory Ducati rider over the course of a whole season.
But now Martin is off to Aprilia.
I understand the decision. Once Ducati confirmed Marquez and Bagnaia, Martin knew he wouldn't be in the factory team whatever he achieved this year. And even though surely had he accepted staying as a satellite rider Ducati would have found him a 2025 bike somewhere despite its split with Pramac, he would still have been effectively cast outside and kept out of the main team for a third time.
He deserved more and he ended up proving it.
Short of a miracle, his 2025 bike is not going to be good enough to win the title, so Martin is playing the long game for the new rules in 2027 - whether that’s by staying with Aprilia or impressing there and earning a move to another factory for the new era.
But the reigning champion’s likely absence from the title fight means everyone is a loser in 2025.
Even if the title fight between Marquez and Bagnaia is a fascinating one, if Marquez wins, people will justifiably say, 'well, Martin already beat Bagnaia fair and square on a satellite bike. This is not special. Marquez needed to beat Martin'.
That would be a terrible way for Marquez's career comeback arc to reach its conclusion. Through the injuries, the excruciating decision to leave Honda, proving himself on a year-old bike this year and then - potentially - tying a bow on it all with a 2025 title, to say at the end 'he did it against weaker competition than he could have' would just be sad and would take away from the accomplishment.
Martin deserves to be on the best bike next year. You could argue that it’s his choice that he isn’t given he opted to leave the Ducati fold of his own volition but that would be missing the point.
I will stop short of saying we're missing out on the battle of the ages in a Martin/Marquez title fight. Because looking at 2024, the only thing that has been lacking for the neutral is a bit of needle and maybe that would have been the case again with Martin vs Marquez.
Bagnaia and Martin have ridden like gentlemen more befitting of a 'duel at dawn' bygone era, rather than producing the WWE-style soap opera battles social media now craves.
Somehow though I think Martin might suspend his self-control in a year-long fight with Marquez, who has managed to inspire animosity in a few of his rivals - most famously Valentino Rossi.
But now we might never know. Given what Martin has achieved this year, he deserved a shot at taking down Marquez on the series' best bike. And we deserve the chance to watch that.
Instead, we're getting Marquez vs a well-beaten Bagnaia, who may well take the motivation of this year's defeat and turn it into a spur, but it feels Marquez is getting the weaker rival given what we've seen in 2024.
And if Martin gets a title-contending bike in 2027, Marquez would be 34 by the end of that season, likely past his best form.
Marquez’s injuries and Honda’s decline meant we spent years feeling we’d never see a proper title fight head to head between the 2010s legend and the best of the 2020s generation. His Ducati move created hope that might happen after all.
Now his next title will probably still have an asterisk.
