Jones offers highest promise he did not knowingly take steroids

Jon Jones was recently stripped of his title for the third time. The first was for a car accident he fled from, after hitting the vehicle operated by a pregnant woman, and breaking her arm. The second was for failing an anti-doping test for the estrogen blocker Clomiphene, which has no ergogenic effect on its own, but would typically be used at the end of a cycle, to restore normal endocrine function. An investigation determined it came from knowingly taking a bootleg erectile dysfunction drug. The third and latest was for metabolites from the steroid Turinabol.

The Turinabol metabolite M3 that Jones tested for can be detected for 45 to 60 days, or more. Jones passed tests for Turinabol and its metabolites on July 6 and July 7. So Jones took Turinabol between July 8 and July 28. But given window for Turinabol metabolites, you wouldn’t take the PED knowing you were going be tested at the end of the month on fight day.

So something doesn’t make sense. An obvious explanation would be a tainted supplement. But Turinabol is expensive, and not something a corrupt nutritional supplement company would put into their potion. So that doesn’t make sense either.

Jones has now denied knowingly taking steroids in the most unequivocal language. It was prompted by a request on his social network.

“Jonny Bones just tell the truth anyway,” tweeted Thomas Kinsella‏. “Everybody will respect you more for it.”

Dude the truth is I would never do steroids, I put that on my children and I put that on my Heavenly Father https://t.co/i8EEbrQU5x

— BONY (@JonnyBones) September 14, 2017

For many years Lance Armstrong swore to the heavens and back that he never took PEDs, and attempted to destroy the lives of people exposing him. But he was doping on a massive scale. Is it possible Jones is as soullessly cynical as the poster child for cheating in sports?

At the first press conference for their rematch Jones gloated about cocaine use.

“I beat you after a weekend of cocaine,” crowed Jones to Cormier. “I had two great weekends back-to-back. Cocaine one weekend, your ass the next. It was great.”

Mike Sager asked Jones why he admitted to using coke.

“As far as me doing coke before a fight, that’s not me trying to be a bad guy,” the fighter replied. “That’s me frickin’ doing a bump—you know, at a party. The truth of the matter is, you’d be surprised how many people have done coke. I’ve been around some of the greatest athletes in the country. Athletes with a lot bigger names than me do coke. But people don’t talk about it.

“I just like to have a good time, man. If you can afford to smoke a little weed, and do a little coke, and still win world titles, who’s to tell you you can’t? I understand these things are illegal. And once you get caught doing it, it’s humiliating. But at the same time, I’m not an addict or anything like that. You don’t see me walking around weighing f***ing 100 pounds with my teeth rotting out and scabs all over my face.”

“If you want to look up to me or love me for some reason, then go right ahead and I’ll try to be somebody that will be remembered for a long time because of winning fights. I would like to try to make a positive impact on people, you know, one way or another. I don’t want to be this bad guy. But at the end of the day, I’m not going out of my way to be Mother Teresa. Nobody asked me to be a saint.”

“I just want to be me, man. I don’t want to be known as a good guy or a bad guy. I just want to be me. I don’t have it in me to try to pretend. I don’t care anymore.”

But even if Jones were as brutally self-absorbed as Armstrong – and there is abundant evidence that he is not – he still wouldn’t have taken Turninabol knowing he would tested. That leaves self destruction, and Jones does not appear to be that either on any grand scale. So thus far this remains a mystery; hopefully, the investigation by CSAC and USASA finds the truth.