(And yet, this is still the most shameful thing that Kevin Casey has ever done.)
Drug testing at the UFC’s back-to-back events in Las Vegas earlier this month caught two more PED-cheaters, who will be facing fines, suspensions, and the overturning of their victories. MMA Junkie broke the news yesterday evening.
We’ll begin with middleweight Kevin Casey, who tested positive for the anabolic steroid drostanolone following his 61-second TKO of Bubba Bush in the curtain-jerking match at UFC 175. The fight represented a second chance in the UFC for “King” Casey, who bounced out of the promotion last year after a stint on TUF 17. Unfortunately, Casey has pissed all over that chance, and might find himself on the chopping block after this one.
And in “enough testosterone to choke a horse” news…
(And yet, this is still the most shameful thing that Kevin Casey has ever done.)
Drug testing at the UFC’s back-to-back events in Las Vegas earlier this month caught two more PED-cheaters, who will be facing fines, suspensions, and the overturning of their victories, pending a formal hearing. MMA Junkie broke the news yesterday evening.
We’ll begin with middleweight Kevin Casey, who tested positive for the anabolic steroid drostanolone following his 61-second TKO of Bubba Bush in the curtain-jerking match at UFC 175 on July 5th. The fight represented a second chance in the UFC for “King” Casey, who bounced out of the promotion last year after a stint on TUF 17. Unfortunately, Casey has pissed all over that chance, and might find himself on the chopping block after this one.
And in “enough testosterone to choke a horse” news, light-heavyweight jiu-jitsu phenom Robert Drysdale was caught with an elevated testosterone-to-epitestosterone (T/E) ratio of 12:1 following his first-round submission win over Keith Berish at the TUF 19 Finale on July 6th. The allowed ratio in Nevada is 6:1, which is already a much higher T/E ratio than any human being should have naturally.
Even though Drysdale’s appearance at the TUF 19 Finale marked his UFC debut, it’s actually the second drug test he’s failed for elevated testosterone. In 2013, Drysdale was denied a license to compete at UFC 167 after an out-of-competition drug test came back with a whopping 19.4:1 testosterone-to-epitestosterone (T/E) ratio. Following his first failed drug test, Drysdale claimed that he was only on TRT for a little over a month, and he wasn’t on it long enough to feel much of an effect. (“I will not take an ounce of blame for dishonesty, because there was no dishonesty on my part. I would take some blame for not understanding the process.”)
I wonder how much blame Drysdale will accept for this one. At any rate, having more failed drug tests than actual fights in the UFC is a bad look. We’ll keep you posted when punishments are officially handed down for Drysdale and Casey.
In the wake of this news, we’ve made a long-overdue update to our MMA and Testosterone Bust Timeline, which turned five years old yesterday. Time flies when you’re juiced to the gills.
“Right now [Belfort is] down in Brazil, or back in you know California, training his butt off and injecting anything that he wants to and loving it, and nobody’s testing him, or like his doctor — when I say his, I’m making quotation fingers ‘doctor’ — so he’s like dripping testosterone out of his eyeballs right now. How old was he when he first failed a drug test, like 18? For anabolic steroids? So he’s being using for 20 years. Your body doesn’t function naturally now. He’s what, 37 or 38? So like 18 years…
(We get it, dude, you’re scary. / Photo via gerbergear.com)
“Right now [Belfort is] down in Brazil, or back in you know California, training his butt off and injecting anything that he wants to and loving it, and nobody’s testing him, or like his doctor — when I say his, I’m making quotation fingers ‘doctor’ — so he’s like dripping testosterone out of his eyeballs right now. How old was he when he first failed a drug test, like 18? For anabolic steroids? So he’s being using for 20 years. Your body doesn’t function naturally now. He’s what, 37 or 38? So like 18 years.
“But there’s no possible way that he could compete at a high level against the Chris Weidmans, the me’s, the Luke Rockholds without chemically enhancing himself. There’s no way. I don’t care if he’s like, drinking Jesus’ blood like he says he is or whatever, it doesn’t work that way. Like, he’s been using steroids for like 15 or 20 years, and he still is using them. If he ever tries to get clean, he can’t compete at this level.”
First off, let’s applaud Kennedy for his use of “the me’s” in a hypothetical list of people that Belfort might fight. I’ve never seen that done before, and Kennedy managed to pull it off.
Beyond that, this is some of the most effective trash-talk I’ve seen in recent memory. It gives Kennedy moral high ground while simultaneously serving as a devastating personal attack, accusing Belfort of using steroids for decades. (And loving it!) Plus, invoking Jesus’s name makes it personal. No matter what happens between Belfort and Weidman, the Phenom will likely want to fight Kennedy next — which is the whole point.
(Bagautinov’s doping wasn’t enough to earn him a victory — but that’s no reason to let him off the hook. / Photo via MMAJunkie)
Now that random drug testing is nailing MMA fighters on a regularbasis, the truth is inescapable: PEDs have become the sport’s most urgent and embarrassing problem. But not every fighter is an anti-drug crusader like Tim Kennedy and Georges St. Pierre. Before his star-making beatdown of Diego Brandao at UFC Fight Night 46 on Saturday, Conor McGregortold MMAJunkie how he really feels about performance-enhancing drugs:
“I don’t really care about that stupid s–t,” McGregor said. “I’m just doing my thing. I’m just performing and getting better. I don’t care what anyone else does….Take whatever you want, I’m still going to whoop your ass.”
“I don’t care if my opponents are cheating or not,” Johnson said. “I train my butt off to fight the man who is put in front of me whether he’s on steroids or not. I want to play on a level playing field, but if they knew about it beforehand and didn’t stop it, at the same time, I took care of business. No big deal.”
Except it is a big deal, and saying otherwise makes MMA look like a joke.
Look, I get it. Claiming that you don’t care if your opponents are doping scores you badass points, and it can endear you to the segment of the MMA fanbase that really doesn’t care about the ongoing scourge of PEDs. (“I like Conor because he doesn’t bitch about drug-testing like these other pussies. Let ’em take what they want!” — Darryl T. Justbleedguy)
(Bagautinov’s doping wasn’t enough to earn him a victory — but that’s no reason to let him off the hook. / Photo via MMAJunkie)
Now that random drug testing is nailing MMA fighters on a regularbasis, the truth is inescapable: PEDs have become the sport’s most urgent and embarrassing problem. But not every fighter is an anti-drug crusader like Tim Kennedy and Georges St. Pierre. Before his star-making beatdown of Diego Brandao at UFC Fight Night 46 on Saturday, Conor McGregortold MMAJunkie how he really feels about performance-enhancing drugs:
“I don’t really care about that stupid s–t,” McGregor said. “I’m just doing my thing. I’m just performing and getting better. I don’t care what anyone else does….Take whatever you want, I’m still going to whoop your ass.”
“I don’t care if my opponents are cheating or not,” Johnson said. “I train my butt off to fight the man who is put in front of me whether he’s on steroids or not. I want to play on a level playing field, but if they knew about it beforehand and didn’t stop it, at the same time, I took care of business. No big deal.”
Except it is a big deal, and saying otherwise makes MMA look like a joke.
Look, I get it. Claiming that you don’t care if your opponents are doping scores you badass points, and it can endear you to the segment of the MMA fanbase that really doesn’t care about the ongoing scourge of PEDs. (“I like Conor because he doesn’t bitch about drug-testing like these other pussies. Let ‘em take what they want!” — Darryl T. Justbleedguy)
But that “Do what thou wilt” stance towards cheating — especially when it’s expressed by champions and top contenders — is exactly the kind of thing that will keep mixed martial arts ghettoized as a small-time sideshow. At a time when MMA’s drug problem is reaching the ears of mainstream sports fans, we don’t need the UFC’s most public faces to play devil’s advocate and argue that doping is acceptable behavior.
To paraphrase the 24th Thesis: Do you half-wits realize that athletes of other sports do not behave this way? Is Yasiel Puig doing interviews claiming that A-Rod should be able to take as many steroids as he wants? Have you ever heard Peyton Manning say, “yeah, the Chargers can grab our face masks all game, we’re still gonna whoop ‘em on Sunday.” Of course not, because why in God’s name would a professional athlete support cheating? Why wouldn’t you care that your opponents are competing with an unfair advantage, if you’re trying to win?
By the estimates of every MMA fighter who has dared to speak out about it, at least half of MMA fighters use performance enhancing drugs. Some fighters, like Matt Serra and Krzysztof Soszynski, have stated that only a small percentage of professional fighters don’t do some form of illegal doping. (“I don’t give a [expletive] if it’s happening in baseball,” Serra said. “But when a guy can kick your head off, someone can get hurt. There’s a chance for serious bodily harm.”) But if you make a stink about it, you’re a troublemaker, and if you pretend that PEDs aren’t really a big deal, you’re a superhero. I mean, after all, it’s a fist fight, y’know? Chemicals don’t give you technique or heart, and those steroids aren’t gonna help you when I touch your chin. Ugh.
Random question: If Demetrious Johnson lost to Ali Bagautinov, would he feel the same way about PEDs — that doping is “no big deal”? And if he tried to defend Bagautinov’s EPO-usage after that loss, how ridiculous would he sound?
MMA fighters are a different breed — for better or worse — and the tough-guy culture of the sport leads generally-rational fighters to say some boneheaded shit. While I’m sure that many MMA fans would be fine with the sport returning to its barely regulated Golden Age (PRIDE NEVA DIE…OR TEST FOR STEROIDS!), anybody who wants to see this sport become universally respected as a legitimate enterprise should be publicly against cheating in all of its forms. Especially the athletes themselves, who this issue actually affects directly.
So we hereby drop the CagePotato Ban on MMA fighters saying they don’t care if their opponents are doping. Steroids and other performance enhancing drugs have become a potential sport-killer, and honestly, you’re not helping.
(“Dear God, please let the lab lose my sample.” / Photo via MMAJunkie)
Recent flyweight title challenger Ali Bagautinov has been suspended for one year following a positive test for erythropoietin (EPO), a unapproved hormone that increases red blood cell production. (See also: Lance Armstrong, Chael Sonnen.) The British Columbia Athletic Commission on Thursday confirmed the news today.
Bagautinov failed a random drug test that was administered on June 2nd, 12 days before his unanimous decision loss to Demetrious Johnson at UFC 174 in Vancouver. As BCAC Commissioner Dave Maedel explained (via MMAJunkie):
“These results were not available prior to the UFC 174 event due to lab processing times…I have suspended Mr. Bagautinov’s licence to compete in British Columbia for a period of one year.”
So not only was UFC 174 the poorest-selling PPV in nine years, it also produced one more victim of MMA’s newest supervillain — the random drug-test. Seriously, increased drug testing is wiping out high-profile fighters left and right lately, which tells you all you need to know about how widespread the doping problem is in this sport. Keep fighting the good fight, athletic commissions.
(“Dear God, please let the lab lose my sample.” / Photo via MMAJunkie)
Recent flyweight title challenger Ali Bagautinov has been suspended for one year following a positive test for erythropoietin (EPO), a unapproved hormone that increases red blood cell production. (See also: Lance Armstrong, Chael Sonnen.) The British Columbia Athletic Commission on Thursday confirmed the news today.
Bagautinov failed a random drug test that was administered on June 2nd, 12 days before his unanimous decision loss to Demetrious Johnson at UFC 174 in Vancouver. As BCAC Commissioner Dave Maedel explained (via MMAJunkie):
“These results were not available prior to the UFC 174 event due to lab processing times…I have suspended Mr. Bagautinov’s licence to compete in British Columbia for a period of one year.”
So not only was UFC 174 the poorest-selling PPV in nine years, it also produced one more victim of MMA’s newest supervillain — the random drug-test. Seriously, increased drug testing is wiping out high-profile fighters left and right lately, which tells you all you need to know about how widespread the doping problem is in this sport. Keep fighting the good fight, athletic commissions.
On July 5 UFC women’s bantamweight champion Ronda Rousey positively destroyed #2 ranked contender Alexis Davis. The fight, UFC 175’s co-main event, was Rousey’s fourth UFC title defense, and lasted just 16 seconds, making it the second shortest title fight in UFC history. The fight was so short that the UFC didn’t even make a highlight video available. If they had, it would have been the entire bout.
Leading into the contest, commentators Joe Rogan and Mike Goldberg tried to sell fans that Davis was going to be a tough test for Rousey. She wasn’t. Davis landed a total of two strikes during the fight, while Rousey landed 16. Most of Rousey’s strikes came after she kneed Davis to the body and threw her to the ground. Once on the mat, Rousey unloaded a series of punches to Davis’ head, and Yves Lavigne mercifully waved off a fight that had to leave some wondering why the matchup was booked in the first place.
At the post-fight media scrum, UFC president Dana White fielded the inevitable question: When will the UFC sign the one female fighter that many feel will give Rousey some true competition, Cris “Cyborg” Justino? Instead of dismissing the question with a tirade about managers, drugs, weight cutting and death — which is White’s usual play — he turned the question around to the media in attendance and asked if they wanted him to sign Justino to the UFC.
White found only one media member that was opposed to the organization signing the current Invicta FC featherweight champion.
After polling the media, White said he didn’t want to hear the media’s “bullshit” if he does sign Justino. “This shit is going to fucking flip as soon as I sign her, about drug testing and all the other bullshit. It will be the biggest fucking topic. It will be the biggest fucking story for you guys to write on whether she’s — oh my fucking God. The script will flip immediately.”
(A vision of a terrifying future? / Photo via FightNext)
On July 5 UFC women’s bantamweight champion Ronda Rousey positively destroyed #2 ranked contender Alexis Davis. The fight, UFC 175’s co-main event, was Rousey’s fourth UFC title defense, and lasted just 16 seconds, making it the second shortest title fight in UFC history. The fight was so short that the UFC didn’t even make a highlight video available. If they had, it would have been the entire bout.
Leading into the contest, commentators Joe Rogan and Mike Goldberg tried to sell fans that Davis was going to be a tough test for Rousey. She wasn’t. Davis landed a total of two strikes during the fight, while Rousey landed 16. Most of Rousey’s strikes came after she kneed Davis to the body and threw her to the ground. Once on the mat, Rousey unloaded a series of punches to Davis’ head, and Yves Lavigne mercifully waved off a fight that had to leave some wondering why the matchup was booked in the first place.
At the post-fight media scrum, UFC president Dana White fielded the inevitable question: When will the UFC sign the one female fighter that many feel will give Rousey some true competition, Cris “Cyborg” Justino? Instead of dismissing the question with a tirade about managers, drugs, weight cutting and death — which is White’s usual play — he turned the question around to the media in attendance and asked if they wanted him to sign Justino to the UFC.
White found only one media member that was opposed to the organization signing the current Invicta FC featherweight champion.
After polling the media, White said he didn’t want to hear the media’s “bullshit” if he does sign Justino. “This shit is going to fucking flip as soon as I sign her, about drug testing and all the other bullshit. It will be the biggest fucking topic. It will be the biggest fucking story for you guys to write on whether she’s — oh my fucking God. The script will flip immediately.”
During the conversation White heard Yahoo.com’s Kevin Iole opine that if Vitor Belfort gets to fight in the UFC, so should Justino.
Iole’s point addressed the fact that Belfort, who failed a 2006 drug test, and a 2014 (out of competition) drug test was mentioned as a potential opponent for UFC middleweight champion Chris Weidman following Weidman’s successful title defense against Lyoto Machida in UFC 175’s main event.
Iole made a valid point with his statement. White did as well, but probably not the one he wanted to make.
White does not get to pick and choose what the media that covers the sport of MMA, and specifically his organization, writes and talks about. Yes, he does a good job of controlling the message through bombast, insults, and myth-making, and he does have the ear of the fans, but so what? If White signs Justino to the UFC (and he should), he’s going to hear from MMA media about Justino’s less-than-pristine history with PEDs and drug testing — just like he’s going to hear about these uncomfortable topics whenever Belfort’s next fight is announced, especially if that Belfort fight is scheduled for anywhere except Las Vegas.
Throughout her career there has been a great deal of speculation about Justino’s use of steroids, and she did in fact fail a 2011 drug test, testing positive for stanozolol metabolites. Justino served a one-year suspension for that failed test. What often gets overlooked is that since that time, Justino passed a 2014 random drug test administered by the Nevada State Athletic Commission (NSAC).
Knowing that Justino has a recently passed random drug test in her back pocket, I’d be much more comfortable with the UFC signing her than I would be with the promotion handing Belfort a title fight directly after his own failed test.
If Justino is signed and booked to fight Rousey, that fight needs to take place in Las Vegas because the state of Nevada has recently shown that they are getting serious with their testing procedures, particularly through random testing. That fact was in evidence when they recently nabbed Chael Sonnen twice for prohibited substances, including human growth hormone (HGH) and recombinant human erythropoietin (EPO).
Justino should have to go through a stringent regime of in-competition and out-of-competition testing if the UFC does sign her, and that testing should be administered by an organization like the NSAC.
Nevada is also where the potential Weidman vs. Belfort contest needs to be booked. With the cloud that hangs over his head, Belfort and the UFC need to get fans to believe he is truly clean before he steps into the Octagon to fight for a title. That won’t happen if he fights in Brazil, or anywhere outside of Las Vegas.
Belfort is going to have to face the NSAC and talk about his failed test, and if they license him to fight in the state, he should have a pamphlet of stipulations that go along with that licensing. One of the biggest stipulations needs to be a robust random drug testing regiment — both in and out of competition.
UFC vice president of regulatory affairs Marc Ratner recently said that the UFC’s goal is to clean up the sport. White has a chance to take some steps toward making that a reality by booking Belfort in Las Vegas, and by signing Justino to a contract.
White does not get to choose what the MMA media writes about, but he does he get to choose who fights for the UFC and where they fight. By signing Justino and booking her to fight in Vegas, and having Belfort fight in Vegas, it will be a good first step toward removing some taint from the sport, and the UFC.
My suggestion? The UFC should sign Justino and book her against Rousey on the same fight card as Weidman vs. Belfort and use that event to highlight the progress that the NSAC and UFC are making toward cleaning up MMA.
Last week’s Nevada State Athletic Commission meeting didn’t quite turn out to be the star-studded circus we all expected. Unfortunately, even this card was subject to change. At one point, it was thought that Chael Sonnen, Vitor Belfort and Wanderlei Silva might all appear—forced to face the music for a variety of drug-related infractions. In the […]
Last week’s Nevada State Athletic Commission meeting didn’t quite turn out to be the star-studded circus we all expected. Unfortunately, even this card was subject to change. At one point, it was thought that Chael Sonnen, Vitor Belfort and Wanderlei Silva might all appear—forced to face the music for a variety of drug-related infractions. In the […]
