Recent flyweight title challenger Ali Bagautinov failed a random drug test prior to his UFC 174 championship bout with Demetrious Johnson, a fight which took place on June 14.
Needless to say, UFC President Dana White isn’t happy about it.
White was succinct in addressing the situation when he made a comment to Kevin Iole of Yahoo Sports.
“I’m beyond disappointed,” White said about Bagautinov’s positive test. “We’re not paying lip service to this. We’re trying to clean this up. It’s hurting everyone in the sport and we’re all over it.”
White’s remarks echo a statement released by Zuffa LLC, the UFC’s parent company, that was issued on UFC.com yesterday in reaction to the release of the test.
As Shaun Al-Shatti of MMA Fighting reported on Thursday, the Russian power puncher tested positive for the performance-enhancing drug Recombinant Human Erythropoietin, better known as EPO, on June 2.
EPO is known to increase stamina and endurance in athletes for short periods of time.
Retired three-time UFC title challenger Chael Sonnen also tested positive for the drug last month and will have a chance to address the Nevada State Athletic Commission at a July 23 hearing.
Bagautinov entered UFC 174 on the strength of an 11-fight win streak and went 25 minutes with the champ but had nothing to offer Mighty Mouse.
According to Fight Metric, Johnson utterly embarrassed Bagautinov in the significant strikes category 133 to 36 and outlanded him 164 to 66 overall.
While Bagautinov landed two takedowns, he landed little to no damage when the fight hit the mat, and Johnson wasted little time in returning to his feet on both occasions.
Prior to the matchup, it was revealed that Bagautinov received a two-year suspension from the International Sambo Federation after failing a drug test for an undisclosed substance, per mixedmartialarts.com.
Will Bagautinov’s suspension send a message to other fighters about using performance-enhancing drugs, or will it have little to no impact on his peers?
John Heinis is a featured columnist for Bleacher Report. He is also the MMA editor for eDraft.com.
Read more MMA news on BleacherReport.com