White: I want to try to help Jon Jones
“I just want to make sure … this kid has so much talent. It’s always the guys with tons of talent that you go, ‘Why is this guy doing this?’ I want to try to help the guy.”
UFC president Dana White appeared recently on The Jim Rome Show, and discussed the treatment that UFC light heavyweight champion Jon Jones is receiving, following his failure of a test for cocaine on Dec 4.
It was initially announced that Jones was entering a treatment program, and when he was home after a day, there was muttering that the program was a sham.
“Everybody was talking about, ‘Oh, he really didn’t go to rehab.'” said White, as transcribed by David St. Martin for MMAFighting. “He went for a 24-hour evaluation into rehab. They evaluated him for 24 hours. When the 24 hours was up they said, ‘You are not an addict.’ OK? But my thing was if you’re doing that four weeks before the biggest fight of your life there’s some type of problem there. There’s something wrong.”
“He’s doing out-patient counseling now. He’s talking to counselors. I just want to make sure … this kid has so much talent. It’s always the guys with tons of talent that you go, ‘Why is this guy doing this?’ I want to try to help the guy.
“They said he didn’t need to stay there. If they would have determined that he needed to stay he would have stayed.”
“It is what it is. I think the kid is growing up and maturing. He is as a fighter, for sure. We’ll see what happens.”