Bisping: Seems like half the MWs are cheats

Until someone in MMA dies from PED abuse, no one has suffered more from them than UFC middleweight Michael Bisping. ‘The Count’ lost to Dan Henderson, who was legally on PEDs. He lost to Wanderlei Silva, who literally ran from a PED test, and is now suspended for years. He lost to Chael Sonnen, who was on PEDs legally and illegally, and is now suspended for two years and retired. He lost to Vitor Belfort who was on PEDs legally, sort of.

In an interview with Damon Martin for FOX Sports, Bisping took aim at the latest figure to use a banned substance, Lyoto Machida. Machida was removed from his fight with Dan Henderson on Saturday at UFC on FOX 19 last Saturday when he came forward and said he had usED 7-keto-DHEA, saying he did not know it was prohibited.

” want to tell you that I really didn’t know about this substance, so I listed it on my declaration form amongst everything else I was taking,” posted Machida on his social network. “This substance was recently banned in 2016, so I take the blame for not knowing that.”

7-keto-DHEA is listed the WADA website as a prohibited drug, and has reportedly been banned at least since the 2012 Olympics. Bisping was not impressed.

“It’s not my favorite subject. It really isn’t. It’s my least favorite subject because I’m tested and I know I sound like a f***ing broken record. I go on about it all the time but here we go again,” said Bisping.

“Lyoto Machida, the f***ing poster boy of martial arts, the f***ing mystic dragon and all this other bulls***. He can say whatever the s*** he wants, but we all know what’s going on.”

“He did not expect USADA to show up at his house and test him. Now he’s taking this product he says has DHEA in it and I’ve looked into this and that’s a hormone that helps with muscle building and strength and all this types of stuff. It only has a shelf life of about 12 to 24 hours. So he fully expected that to be out of his system by the time he was going to get tested or by the time the fight came.

“What he didn’t expect was USADA to show up at his door. The damage control comes out — ‘oh I’ve taken this supplement that has this product in it but I didn’t know.’ It’s very simple. All you’ve got to do is Google any supplements that have that product in it and then say you were taking that.”

“Listen, it’s our responsibility as athletes to know what we put in our bodies. That is not an excuse. It’s just like Yoel Romero, that was absolute nonsense as well. The fact that USADA let Yoel Romero off with a six-month fine completely undermines all the hard work they’ve done.

“I find it to be an absolute mockery and I think Lyoto Machida should be ashamed of himself, and it should be no shorter than a two-year suspension period.”

“It’s disgraceful. If you look at all these Brazilians that are failing tests. I just feel sorry for the younger generation of Brazilian fighters, I really do. They look at these guys as heroes, they look up them and aspire to be like them and it turns out a lot of them are cheating.

“I’m not saying all Brazilians, far from it, but it certainly does seem to be a trend lately. I’m not knocking Brazilians, I’m just knocking a few key Brazilian mixed martial artists — Anderson Silva, Vitor Belfort and now Lyoto Machida. Three of the biggest names.”

“It’s disappointing. It’s bad for mixed martial arts, it’s bad for the UFC, it’s bad for our public perception because things like this make headlines. People that maybe don’t know the sport see the headline and say ‘oh another UFC guy tests positive’ and they make the assumption that the majority of us our using performance enhancing drugs, which isn’t the case at all.

“If you go through the top 10 of the middleweight division and that’s just the middleweight division mind you, I mean Yoel Romero, Vitor Belfort, Anderson Silva, Lyoto Machida, Hendo was on TRT. I don’t know who I’m missing but it seems like half of the top guys, they’re all cheats.”