Anthony Smith has revealed that Jon Jones failed every drug test he took in the lead up to their light-heavyweight title fight at UFC 235 in March 2019.
‘Bones’ successfully defended his title against Smith with a lopsided points victory. ‘Lionheart’ famously continued to fight despite taking a flush illegal knee from Jones in round four of the fight.
Smith has rebounded from the loss and is currently working his way back up the 205lb rankings. Until recently, he’d had a fairly friendly relationship with Jones, but things changed when the former light-heavyweight champion took shots at Smith for losing to Glover Teixeira and also commented on his old rival’s handling of a home invasion.
Ahead of his most recent bout with Jimmy Crute, Smith provided some interesting details on his relationship with Jon Jones and explained exactly what happened ahead of their title fight during an appearance on The Jenna Ben Show.
“I’m in the same place,” Smith said about Jones not being good person but a great fighter. “After the Glover fight, he had a lot of negative things to say and kind of had taken some shots at me for the break-in and kind of making fun of me which really was kind of out of left field. Because I’ve never attacked Jon personally.
“Up until that very point, he had never taken a shot at me personally. He’d obviously said he’s gonna kick my ass, he’s even said, ‘I don’t like that he said this,’ but he’s never been able to refute anything I said because I always talk about Jon very factually.
“He does this well, he does that well, he was suspended for this, but I never get into his drug test bullsh*t,” Smith added. “I never even told anyone Jon failed every drug test the entire week leading up to our fight. Every single drug test. I never brought it up one time in any interview, in any media thing, nothing. The commission called me every day to let me know he was still failing his drug tests. I never said anything, I let it be because I was just focused on myself and always believed that if you just focus on yourself you’re going to be that much more successful.” (Transcribed by BJPENN.com)
Are you shocked to hear Anthony Smith confirm Jon Jones failed every drug test in UFC 235 fight week?