Ufc 232 ... Wtf?

What a mess UFC 232 has become.

Jon 'Bones' Jones has tested positive for an anabolic steroid again. However, further testing (I presume atomic spectroscopy, possibly combined with CIR) confirmed this result was merely a “pulsing" effect from the earlier positive (according to none other Jeff Novitzky).

What makes this so entertaining is that the positive only came to light on the 23rd (control administered on the 9th), and the long-awaited Bones-vs-Gustafsson rematch was slated for the 29th at UFC 232 in Lost Wages. And quicker than you can say blackjack, the NSAC pulled Bones's license to fight in the state. Rather than risk the event on his ability to sweet-talk the NSAC into changing its mind in less than six days, Dana White celebrated Christmas Eve by announcing that the UFC was moving the event to Inglewood, California. Within the last month CSAC has sanctioned the first prizefight in the USA featuring a transsexual fighter, whereas Nevada has a blanket prohibition against testosterone therapy, so the Californians obviously are much more 'enlightened' with regards to steroid use than Nevada is.

DW is quick to offer that Jones 'didn't do anything wrong.' I presume he meant "this time."

So if you had booked a flight to and hotel room in Las Vegas for the event, too bad, so sad. But fans aren't the only ones complaining.

As would be expected, Guss is not particularly happy, and he and Bones are having a urination festival on social media. Which doesn't exactly rise to the level of a Whistler-vs-Wilde contest (but I can cut Guss some slack on account of English is not his first language).

Amanda Nunes is unhappy with having to pay California income tax, which apparently is some higher than Nevada.

And these days Mark Hunt can't pass up an opportunity to bash the UFC, and in this case he left no profanity unturned. But IMHO his opening salvo sums it all up: "hey everyone let’s move the whole Ufc show in a week for a cheater".

It beggars belief that the UFC still hires the man.

On an interesting side note, Jones has enrolled in the Voluntary Anti-Doping Association (who knew there was such a thing?). By signing on to VADA an athlete agrees to unannounced testing at any time in the eight weeks preceding an athletic event. Which if nothing else surely must mean that Jones is up to date on his adulterants and masking agents.

One thing I have learned about Dana White is to never be surprised by how low he is willing to stoop to sell a ticket. It has been obvious for some time to anyone willing to look that Jon Jones is toxic, a train wreck in slow motion. Yet DW would appear to be willing (and able) to move heaven and earth to keep Jones fighting for his organization.


Regardless, it should be a very entertaining fight card. Besides Bones-Guss, there's the almost-as-anticipated Cyborg-vs-Nunes. Andre Arlovski is on the under card and the former BJ Penn is on the under-under card.

Anti doping agency? hahaha, its gear we know plenty of guys run something when they can and get away with it

This is interesting though its his what 2nd-3rd time now and what did they get him on now?

This is rich. Bones is the only human I know who could fuck up a peanut butter sandwich.

He's already declined to take VADA's first out-of-competition drug test. Hey, the 'V' does stand for "voluntary," right?

Apparently Jones signed the VADA contract without reading the fine print. Now that his lawyer has read it, he doesn't like how they do business.

So if he's clean, why would he have any heartburn about a random OOC test?

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Originally Posted by EDCG19

...This is interesting though its his what 2nd-3rd time now and what did they get him on now?

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In round numbers it's the third but USADA is claiming this is like a 'hangover' from #2 and doesn't indicate recent use. The first positive was for PCT stuff and #s 2 & 3 were for an AAS.

Bones had taken eight OOCs in the last six months and the first seven all were negative. USADA is claiming it isn't possible that he could have taken a dose big enough to be of any benefit after they gave him test #7 and before test #8 and have the mount present in his system be so small. Their conclusion is that there has been no "re-introduction" of the drug.

But the move from Vegas to LA is still Jone's fault for taking the "tainted supplement" that caused positive #2 (and #3, if you buy USADA's "science"). And that's only if you buy the "tainted supplement" explanation. But even if it was a tainted supplement, it was his decision and his alone to take it.

Jones killed off UFC 151. It had to be canceled because his opponent in the main event (Hendo) got hurt and Jones refused to accept Sonnen as a substitute. And he knocked the wind out of the sails of UFC 200 when USADA announced he'd been popped for PEDs three days before the event. Jones cost them the event's marquee fight but it went on on the strength of the card, which they had loaded to the gills on account of it was the 200th UFC.

Plus Bones has had two car crashes under suspicious circumstances (probably drunk or stoned and disappeared until he sobered up), and in the second instance he broke the arm of a pregnant woman when he crashed into her car, then fled the scene.

After the first Cormier fight, he was so intent on further humiliating DC -- add insult to injury -- that he bragged he'd spent the weekend before the fight doing cocaine. And after the hit-and-run on the pregnant woman, the police found a pot pipe with weed residue on it in his car.

After the second crash he voluntarily admitted himself to a residential drug rehab program, stayed one night, pronounced himself cured, and walked out.

And he fights dirty, knee kicks meant to cripple and he takes all the free eye pokes the rules allow. Which used to be two. You didn't get penalized until the third. But they've cracked down on that shit since his last fight, which could be a problem.

Less so because Herb Dean is on the injury list (type of injury not given) so he can't ref the Bones-Guss fight, as was scheduled.

I have no problems with AAS use in sports like MMA. Just be honest about it and don't try puling the wool over people eyes to sell PPV. Dana White is the Don King of MMA.

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Originally Posted by Beetlegeuse

This is rich. Bones is the only human I know who could fuck up a peanut butter sandwich.

He's already declined to take VADA's first out-of-competition drug test. Hey, the 'V' does stand for "voluntary," right?

Apparently Jones signed the VADA contract without reading the fine print. Now that his lawyer has read it, he doesn't like how they do business.

So if he's clean, why would he have any heartburn about a random OOC test?


In round numbers it's the third but USADA is claiming this is like a 'hangover' from #2 and doesn't indicate recent use. The first positive was for PCT stuff and #s 2 & 3 were for an AAS.

Bones had taken eight OOCs in the last six months and the first seven all were negative. USADA is claiming it isn't possible that he could have taken a dose big enough to be of any benefit after they gave him test #7 and before test #8 and have the mount present in his system be so small. Their conclusion is that there has been no "re-introduction" of the drug.

But the move from Vegas to LA is still Jone's fault for taking the "tainted supplement" that caused positive #2 (and #3, if you buy USADA's "science"). And that's only if you buy the "tainted supplement" explanation. But even if it was a tainted supplement, it was his decision and his alone to take it.

Jones killed off UFC 151. It had to be canceled because his opponent in the main event (Hendo) got hurt and Jones refused to accept Sonnen as a substitute. And he knocked the wind out of the sails of UFC 200 when USADA announced he'd been popped for PEDs three days before the event. Jones cost them the event's marquee fight but it went on on the strength of the card, which they had loaded to the gills on account of it was the 200th UFC.

Plus Bones has had two car crashes under suspicious circumstances (probably drunk or stoned and disappeared until he sobered up), and in the second instance he broke the arm of a pregnant woman when he crashed into her car, then fled the scene.

After the first Cormier fight, he was so intent on further humiliating DC -- add insult to injury -- that he bragged he'd spent the weekend before the fight doing cocaine. And after the hit-and-run on the pregnant woman, the police found a pot pipe with weed residue on it in his car.

After the second crash he voluntarily admitted himself to a residential drug rehab program, stayed one night, pronounced himself cured, and walked out.

And he fights dirty, knee kicks meant to cripple and he takes all the free eye pokes the rules allow. Which used to be two. You didn't get penalized until the third. But they've cracked down on that shit since his last fight, which could be a problem.

Less so because Herb Dean is on the injury list (type of injury not given) so he can't ref the Bones-Guss fight, as was scheduled.

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Joe Rogan has Jeff Novetsky on today and I'm sure theyll cover it
Jeff is the USADA guy if I remember correctly he gets these guys in trouble for AAS

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Originally Posted by Ashop

I have no problems with AAS use in sports like MMA. Just be honest about it and don't try puling the wool over people eyes to sell PPV. Dana White is the Don King of MMA.

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Neither do I. I dont see any issue with these fighters on any kind of performance enhancing drugs as most people do it one way or the other
The controversy comes in because AAS usage makes you too good and it could be dangerous since it's a contact sport and you're trying to beat the shit out of the other guy so health risks are a concern
I would probably say AAS would.l probably act more of a defense or protective element to the MMA game


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One of the problems with PEDs in sports is that if they're unregulated, who wins could be determined by who is willing to put their life (or health) more at risk. Then you make every sport a death sport.

The second problem, and one of the things I know from following pro cycling all these years, and this is particularly true of blood vector doping, is that allowing PEDs doesn't level the playing field because there are "high responders" and "low responders." Some people benefit more than others.

One of the reasons EPO made Lance Pharmstrong such an extraordinary cyclist is that his natural physiology was very ordinary. His natural hematocrit was high 30s, which is abnormally low for an endurance athlete. People like Tyler Hamilton and Marco Pantani had natural Hcts in the low 40s. This was important because even before there was a direct test for EPO, they still could test for Hct level and they used Hct as an indirect indication of EPO use. They arbitrarily set the Hct limit at 50.0, so even without an EPO test, cyclists could skirt the rules by keeping their Hct below 50. So riders whose natural Hct was lower got more benefit from EPO for the simple fact that they could get away with taking more of it.

The reason he won 7 TdFs (before he didn't win 7 TdFs) is that Pharmstrong's entire team had the best doping program. They employed marginal gains and used every PED available, even if it only gave a tiny gain, and they used science that was the equal of the anti-doping testers' so they could fly just under the radar.


But there's no question that it improves the spectacle. Except in the case of cycling because it allowed the team with the best doping program to dominate the sport. Which made it boring because the outcome was pre-determined. But baseball was far more exciting during the days of the Bash Brothers and the homerun derby. And would you rather see a 'roided-up Brock Lesnar fight, or a clean Brock Lesnar?

EDIT:
In fact, there's something similar going on in cycling now. There's a British-based team, Sky, that bears eerie similarity to the US Postal Team that Pharmstrong ran. Sky is the equivalent of "the Big Blue Train" that Lance commanded back in the day. They've won six of the last seven TdFs, partly because they've got the most high-priced talent of any team in the sport, but there's also plenty of evidence they're running the best doping program.

Ironic that I brought up the topic of Lance Pharmstrong. Because now he's crawled all up in Jeff Novitzky's ass over the "double-standard" the UFC is applying to Jon Jones.

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Couple of ?'s - why the double standard for Jones and others? And let’s get right to it, what does the science and scientists say? I think I know the answer, but let’s let the star fucker speak to it.

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Funny a highschool dropout (with barely a passing acquaintance of proper English syntax, grammar and punctuation) going after the man who ran the BALCO investigation over the science of a doping investigation.


I don't believe for a New York second that White or the UFC or anybody but the facts influenced Novitzky's position on this one. It's just that Pharmstrong is a dick, and true to his dick-ness he couldn't resist taking the cheap shot at Novitzky. Because the evidence Novitzky uncovered in his criminal investigation against Pharmstrong and his international doping syndicate (which was summarily terminated by Sheikh Obama, piss be upon him) formed the bedrock of USADA's case against him, which ended up stripping him of all his cycling wins.


EDIT:
This stuff is getting TOO FUNNY.

Apparently Jones was at a press conference somewheres and in his own defense, he says:

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There is something in my system that is microscopic, that is so small, that does not help me do shit.

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At which point somebody in the crowd yells back,

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A soul?

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In fairness, but not in defense of Jones, if you are training and taking a lot of supplements (legal orals/powders, pre-workout, post-workout, etc.) it makes sense to not want to be tested unless absolutely necessary. They have run some of the supps through testing and found banned substances. I don't do drugs but I don't like getting drug tested for a job because so I think it's legit to have concern. He has a known tendency to party as well and is likely just not wanting to risk coming up positive for something. The level for "positive" is set for a reason and he was far from that so he should be considered negative.

Personally, I think he uses when he can, but so does everyone else in UFC with a few exceptions.

As far as policing it so as not to make it a "death sport" where is the line where we let people do what they want and feel the need to protect them from themselves?

Jones is an elite athlete with mad skills and personally I don't think he wins based on benefits of steroids compared to any other fighters. He was a menace from day one in the UFC - he's just a f*ck up and an easy target, compounded by his arrogance and mouth.

Interesting to see what the fight results will be.

Jones mocks a woman reporter, telling her 'sit down' and 'you suck' and calling for 'better journalism' because she had the audacity to ask Dana White why Jones isn't being suspended. At first he refused to answer her questions, then he got rude when she posed the same questions to DW.


And this guy has a laundry list of reasons why he thinks the UFC's excuse is bullshit.

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Originally Posted by TrailRunAZ

...Interesting to see what the fight results will be.

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I'm not betting against him. Hell, I still think Gus won the first fight.


EDIT:
Lengthy Q&A with Novitzky

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Originally Posted by Beetlegeuse

Jones mocks a woman reporter, telling her 'sit down' and 'you suck' and calling for 'better journalism' because she had the audacity to ask Dana White why Jones isn't being suspended. At first he refused to answer her questions, then he got rude when she posed the same questions to DW.


And this guy has a laundry list of reasons why he thinks the UFC's excuse is bullshit.



I'm not betting against him. Hell, I still think Gus won the first fight.


EDIT:
Lengthy Q&A with Novitzky

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Oh he's a walking disaster for sure. Just watching his interviews and interactions makes it hard to watch him in the ring though, because you can't help but hope he'll get his noggin dented.

The "soul" quote above is epic. Laughed my arse off. Tragically true.

Regarding UFC, they are a business. Expecting them to behave any differently from Trump, Zuckerberg, big pharma, etc., is naive. They are in the business to make money period. Fighters just happen to be their economic product.

Well that was unexpected. I actually thought Cyborg-Nunes would come down to whoever got clipped first, but if it was going to come so soon and be so one-sided, I was expecting it to go the other way.

But dayum I loved seeing Cyborg get KOed.

Well shit. I thought Gus was coming out too tentative in the second. Bones is the wrong man to be trying to out-point, he should have got all his measuring done in the first and come out in the second swinging for the cheap seats.

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Originally Posted by TrailRunAZ

Regarding UFC, they are a business. Expecting them to behave any differently from Trump, Zuckerberg, big pharma, etc., is naive. They are in the business to make money period. Fighters just happen to be their economic product.

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I think you have hit it right on with your comments.
I do not take drugs, but I always worry about drug tests. Did I accidentally eat poppy seeds on something, will any combination of my supps cause a false positive? If so, no one will believe me that I don’t take drugs.

As far as the business, just the length of this post shows the publicity it gets. People complaining is still publicity.
Come on guys, we like to see two people locked in a cage beating the f**k out of each other. The more blood, the better the fight.
DW built an empire and hats off to his visionary talents. Let’s just hope he doesn’t screw it up.
I remember in the 90’s when it was only available underground or PPV.


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Originally Posted by charger69

I think you have hit it right on with your comments.
I do not take drugs, but I always worry about drug tests. Did I accidentally eat poppy seeds on something, will any combination of my supps cause a false positive? If so, no one will believe me that I don’t take drugs.

As far as the business, just the length of this post shows the publicity it gets. People complaining is still publicity.
Come on guys, we like to see two people locked in a cage beating the f**k out of each other. The more blood, the better the fight.
DW built an empire and hats off to his visionary talents. Let’s just hope he doesn’t screw it up.
I remember in the 90’s when it was only available underground or PPV.


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Times have changed for sure bro

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Originally Posted by charger69

...DW built an empire and hats off to his visionary talents. Let’s just hope he doesn’t screw it up....

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I think you're giving White w-a-a-a-a-y too much credit in building this "empire." I don't see him as one of the more notable talents involved. His role in the past was just what you note is his role in the future. Don't fuck up other people's hard work.

WME already has been pretty cut-throat with their staffing decisions (cut 80% of the staff of UFC Canada) and I think they've only kept him on short-term (5 years) in the interest of continuity. I will be surprised if they don't cut him when his contract runs out in favor of someone "home grown."

And BTW, Gustafsson said he got tagged in the first and never got his legs back, I have a hard time swallowing that because his footwork and head movement all looked fine. I think what happened is that Jones came with a strategy no one was expecting, and executed it pretty damn well.

Now Jones has a fight scheduled against Anthony Smith at UFC 235, on 2 March. Contingent, of course, on NSAC agreeing that his latest positive was due to the "pulsing" phenomenon and granting him a license to fight.

It's the shortest turn-around I can find for him since 2011 when he fought Ryan Bader at UFC 126 and Shogun Rua 42 days later at UFC 128.

Jones' post-UFC 232 controls all came back negative. Including no M3 metabolite of turinabol.

To the unwashed masses, this undoubtedly will be mistaken for him being clean.

MMA Fighting dot Com is reporting UFC 232 sold 700,000 PPVs, the second most of any 2018 UFC after UFC 229, Khabib vs McGregor, which sold 2.4 million.

I'm a little skeptical of MMAF's number because it's less than 1/3rd of UFC 229, and I'm hard pressed to believe fans are so undiscerning as to think that a McGregor clown show is worth 3x as much as a card with both Bones-Gustaffson and Cyborg-Nunes title fights on it (McGregor, in case you haven't been paying attention, doesn't hold a belt and hasn't won a fight since November of 2016). The other reason I'm skeptical is that MMA Payout dot Com makes it their business to guesstimate PPV sales based on historical and peripheral information, and it usually takes them months to arrive at their final number, but barely two weeks have passed since UFC 232.


And on a completely unrelated note, Anderson 'the Spider' Silva is lobbying for the return of TRT to the UFC. Yeah, like that's going to happen.

Apparently Bones's shyster warmed up to the Voluntary Anti-Doping Association's terms because Jones submitted to a VADA test the day before the fight and 33 trillionths of a gram of the same metabolite of turinabol showed up. But the USADA test administered right after the fight came back cleans. So the "pulsing" thing is beginning to look plausible. Either that or the labs are using dirty test tubes.

Which is unfortunate because this gives dopers who are caught in the future another potential excuse to use, especially since (if I'm not mistaken) this sets a new record for the greatest length of time the "pulsing" is documented to have occurred from the initial positive, 17 months. Which prompted Daniel Cormier (who never lets an opportunity to 'dis' Bones go to waste) to question whether Jones will have turinabol in his system for the rest of his life.

This probably also will clear the deck for Jones to get an NSAC license to fight for UFC 235.

Based on their usual "scholarly" research, MMA Payout dot Com is estimating that UFC 232 sold 350-375,000 PPVs, quite a bit short of MMA Fighting dot Com's claim of 700,000. IMHO it does not bode well for the new owners of the UFC if they can't sell half a million PPVs on a card that features Jones-Gustafsson and Cyborg-Nunes. Especially since (according to Dana White) the last minute move from Lost Wages to Mexifornia cost the promotion $6 million, which puts one hell of a divot in the P&L sheet.

The live gate for UFC 232 was 15,862 seats for $2,066,604. MMA Payout compares this to UFC 199, also held at the Inglewood Forum, when Michael Bisping was a last-minute replacement for Chris Weidman against Luke Rockhold, The paid live attendance that night was 15,587.


EDIT:
And Anderson Silva is lobbying Dana White for a "super" fight against Conor McGregor. But I don't get the "super" part.

Bones is laying the grounds for his next PEDs defense. He's saying he's afraid to eat out for fear someone will spike his food.

I'm sure every restaurant chef and diner cook in the greater Albuquerque area keeps a vial on Turinabol on their spice shelf, right next to the MSG, just in case Jon Jones drops by for a bite to eat.

Lmao

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Originally Posted by Beetlegeuse

Bones is laying the grounds for his next PEDs defense. He's saying he's afraid to eat out for fear someone will spike his food.

I'm sure every restaurant chef and diner cook in the greater Albuquerque area keeps a vial on Turinabol on their spice shelf, right next to the MSG, just in case Jon Jones drops by for a bite to eat.

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Quote:

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Originally Posted by Beetlegeuse

Apparently Bones's shyster warmed up to the Voluntary Anti-Doping Association's terms because Jones submitted to a VADA test the day before the fight and 33 trillionths of a gram of the same metabolite of turinabol showed up. But the USADA test administered right after the fight came back cleans. So the "pulsing" thing is beginning to look plausible. Either that or the labs are using dirty test tubes.

Which is unfortunate because this gives dopers who are caught in the future another potential excuse to use, especially since (if I'm not mistaken) this sets a new record for the greatest length of time the "pulsing" is documented to have occurred from the initial positive, 17 months. Which prompted Daniel Cormier (who never lets an opportunity to 'dis' Bones go to waste) to question whether Jones will have turinabol in his system for the rest of his life.

This probably also will clear the deck for Jones to get an NSAC license to fight for UFC 235.

Based on their usual "scholarly" research, MMA Payout dot Com is estimating that UFC 232 sold 350-375,000 PPVs, quite a bit short of MMA Fighting dot Com's claim of 700,000. IMHO it does not bode well for the new owners of the UFC if they can't sell half a million PPVs on a card that features Jones-Gustafsson and Cyborg-Nunes. Especially since (according to Dana White) the last minute move from Lost Wages to Mexifornia cost the promotion $6 million, which puts one hell of a divot in the P&L sheet.

The live gate for UFC 232 was 15,862 seats for $2,066,604. MMA Payout compares this to UFC 199, also held at the Inglewood Forum, when Michael Bisping was a last-minute replacement for Chris Weidman against Luke Rockhold, The paid live attendance that night was 15,587.


EDIT:
And Anderson Silva is lobbying Dana White for a "super" fight against Conor McGregor. But I don't get the "super" part.

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The UFC and MMA as a whole is starting to look more and more like boxing. Which is why I stopped watching boxing...

...and the "pulsing" continues. JJ has had five controls since the last 28 days (plus one that the results aren't back from yet) and two of them show minuscule amounts of a turinabol metabolite.

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The full test results and agency that conducted the test include:

Feb. 1 (U.S. Anti-Doping Agency) – No adverse analytical findings.
Feb. 9 (Voluntary Anti-Doping Association, in California) – No adverse analytical findings.
Feb. 14 (Nevada State Athletic Commission) – Adverse Analytical finding. DHCMT M3 detected 40 pg/mL.
Feb. 15 (Nevada State Athletic Commission) – Adverse Analytical finding. DHCMT M3 detected 20 pg/mL.
Feb. 18 (Voluntary Anti-Doping Association, in Nevada) – No adverse analytical findings.

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The gift that keeps on giving.