Dana White: We’re going to f@$#!% come down on PEDs
UFC President Dana White carreer has seen the unfolding of bold predicitions. He took control of the UFC with the promise to…
UFC President Dana White carreer has seen the unfolding of bold predicitions. He took control of the UFC with the promise to see the sport of mixed martial arts regulated, back on PPV, and on free TV.
That happened, and the results were the world’s fastest growing sport.
Now White says he is going after PEDs in MMA.
“Believe me when I tell you, we are going to f—— come down on this thing,” White said following Saturday’s UFC 145 press conference. “We are going to do it.”
“I love when the media comes after us about all the steroid and testosterone s—,” White said. “I’m going to say it again: We’re the f—— platinum standard for this s— in all of sports. We are. We test when we don’t need to test. We do s— that we don’t need to do. We go above and beyond to make this thing right, and do you think – for example, look at the spot we’re sitting in right now. Do you think we don’t give a s— about this? We don’t want anybody doing this stuff. We don’t want anybody using banned substances or drugs or anything else. It destroys everything – not only questions about the credibility of the sport and everything else, but it destroys big fights. Everybody was excited for this fight and wanted to see it.
“Listen, there’s a lot of people who like to talk s— about us. We’ve done a lot of great things in the last 11 years with this sport, from building it to what it is today, guys making s—loads of money, health insurance for all the fighters, getting on FOX. We’ve done things that people said we would never, ever f—— do. We’ve accomplished all these things. Whether it’s fighter safety or whatever it is, we always do the right thing, and we come out with what I think is the best way to handle it.”
“Is it me running around and testing 375 fighters all over the world? No. You guys can talk all the s— you want about that. It’s not going to happen, but we will figure something out. Maybe it’s WADA (World Anti-Doping Agency).”
Of immediate relevance to PEDs in MMA, is the case of Alistair Overeem, who appears before the Nevada State Athletic Commission on Tuesday.
Depending on the content of Overeem’s defense, the NSAC has several options. They could license him, presumably conditionally. They could suspend him for up to a year for a violation of the conditional license granted for the Lesnar fight. Or they could refuse to license, with a mandatory waiting period of up to a year before re applying.
In all cases, White couldn’t wait.
“I’ve got my marketing people terrorizing me,” White told MMAjunkie.com. “It just gets to the point where you’ve got to run your business. I tried to wait.
“Anybody who knows anything abut the pay-per-view business, we’re already past the deadline. We’ve got to run with it, and I’m not feeling too optimistic… There’s so much more that goes into this that you guys don’t know. If we don’t get into the loop on pay-per-view, you don’t get in a lot of the systems. There’s just so many things that we have to do to run the business.”
“It was either Mir or Werdum, and Werdum is going to fight down in Brazil on the Brazil card, I believe. Mir was already training. Mir was already on the card, and Mir makes a lot of sense.”
The all-heavyweight UFC 146 card will apparently remain just that. Hunt vs. Struve is stil on, and Velasquez will remain on the card, possibly against Ben Rothwell.
Overeem’s future is less sure.
“I honestly don’t know what they’re going to do to that dude,” White said. “I’m not very optimistic about it.”
“I’m still angry. I’m not angry with the commission. The commission is doing their job. That’s what they do.
“I sat down in a room with Alistair, and he told me, ‘They can test me anytime they want. I’m the most tested athlete in all of sports.'”
“We’ll see what happens. I don’t know, man. This isn’t really my deal.
“I’ve had situations with lots of people. It’s how you f—— handle yourself as a man in life, in business and everything else. You sit down and tell me one thing and it’s not true, or you’re doing another thing, then f— you.”
