Jon Jones answers the asterisk question

At-the-time UFC light heavyweight champion Jon Jones beat Daniel Cormier via Unanimous Decision at UFC 182 on January 3, 2015. On April 28, Jones was stripped of his title for violating the UFC’s Athlete Code of Conduct policy; Jones had gotten in a car accident, hitting a pregnant woman and breaking her arm, before fleeing on foot.

Jones returned from that suspension and beat Ovince Saint Preux via Unanimous Decision for the interim belt at UFC 197 on April 23, 2016. Jones was later stripped of that title and suspended after testing positive for clomiphene and letrozole. The source of the failed anti-doping test was determined to be a tainted, bootleg, erectile dysfunction pill.

Jones returned from that suspension and defeated Daniel Cormier via KO at UFC 214 on July 29, 2017, only to see the bout changed to a No Contest and the title stripped after he tested positive for turinabol.

Jon Jones is likely the greatest fighter in mixed martial arts history. And in the eyes of many, he has the PED asterisk. However, a careful evaluation of his failures indicates he is an all too human f*** up, but not a doper. During a recent appearance on the Jackson-Wink podcast, Jones was asked to reply to people who think his accomplishments have an asterisk.

I would say that those would be people looking for an excuse not to give it to me, not to give credit where it’s due, said Jones, as transcribed by Damon Martin for MMA Weekly. In both situations, whatever was in me chemically was proven scientifically that the amounts were so small that there was no way possible to affect my performance in a positive or a negative way.Jon Jones UFC 214 weigh

The two times where I’ve failed drug tests for performance enhancers, it’s been so small that it can’t affect your performance.

The d*** pill situation, that was proven that it was a mistake. Who takes a male enhancement pill expecting to fight better. I mean nobody. We actually found the company, found the exact pills, we ordered the pills and the pills came back with stuff in it that wasn’t supposed to be in there. Such a small amount that it’s not going to make you fight any better or be stronger.

Then in the second situation, we just found out to have USADA say ‘the amount of steroids we found in your body Jon, it was like taking a pinch of salt and throwing it in an Olympic size swimming pool’. It was such a small amount that it was pretty obvious this was an accident. For this to be something that got into your body two weeks before the fight. So two weeks before the fight, you took a pinch of steroids and threw it in an Olympic size swimming pool. It’s clear this is nothing that helped you knock out Daniel Cormier.

To answer your question — to anybody who would say ‘well he must have been cheating’ — after what I just said, if you still want to call me a cheater, you just don’t want to admit that I’m f***ing pretty good at this.

Jones fights Alexander Gustafsson at UFC 232 on December 29, 2018 at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada for the light heavyweight championship.