The 'Anderson Silva Effect': What A Second Drug Suspension Means For Jon Jones

Jon Jones should be in a soap opera. Regardless of how euphoric a moment is for the current UFC light-heavyweight champion, he always finds a way to add a bit of drama to proceedings.

The most naturally talented martial artist of all time, but one of the most mentally immature. An ex-champion with one of the most successive title defences of all time, but stripped of his belt following a hit-and-run attack on a pregnant woman. And when it looked like Jones was set to get the opportunity to get his life back at the marquee UFC 200, he was flagged for a doping offence by USADA, followed by a further one year ban from competition.

However, nowhere is that soap opera bi-polarism better illustrated by this morning's news. Having brutally knocked out main rival Daniel Cormier with a left high kick in the main event of UFC 214 to reclaim the title he never lost in the Octagon, Jones seemed to have achieved the ultimate redemption.

But, almost inevitably, the story was not finished. This morning, Jones was again flagged for a potential doping violation by USADA, taken from his sample provided at the weigh-ins the day before the UFC 214 bout.

Initial reports suggest that the substance found was Turinabol, an anabolic steroid based on a derivation of testosterone. This isn't the first time that USADA has encountered the substance, with ex-UFC heavyweight Frank Mir testing positive for the drug last year. Should the use of Turinabol in the Jones case be confirmed, it would appear to be more conclusive and damning than the failed test before UFC 200, which was for an oestrogen blocker. I think Jon would struggle to suggest that "dick pills" were full of steroids - unless he's really looking to boost performance!

The impact on Jon Jones' career is potentially significant if found guilty. As this is his second offence, a four year ban from competition could be the penalty, and comes at the worst possible time. Having just entered his thirties, Jones is now in the prime of his career, and a four-year layoff would be difficult, if not impossible, to come back from. Dana White himself, reacting to today's news, said as much, suggesting that the UFC 214 victory could be the last time that we see Jones inside the Octagon if found guilty.

There's no doubt that even being associated with another doping scandal will affect Jones' career. Certainly the super fight with ex-UFC heavyweight Brock Lesnar is off the cards for the medium-term, while White also claimed that a title fight with current heavyweight champion Stipe Miocic was in the works for UFC 218. I think it's safe to say that there is more than a little doubt in that now!

Jones has made it clear in press conferences since the Cormier fight that he, like so many others in the UFC at present, are chasing the money fights over the traditional legitimacy of the competition. With both Lesnar and Miocic likely to provide huge cheques, Jon's set to lose more than a little cash! However, regardless of the result of the investigation, this has the potential to affect Jones' future earnings. Dana White was already concerned at the prospect of offering a headline spot at UFC 214 after his previous failed test - can you honestly say that this, whether he is found innocent or not, will slow that school of thought?

Most damaging of all for Jones, however, are the questions that are now likely to be asked of all of his previous accomplishments. Also known as the 'Anderson Silva effect', the failed drug test has the potential to ruin the legacy of the greatest of all time. Would he have had the stamina to beat Daniel Cormier at UFC 182? Would he have had the heart to overcome the challenge of Alexander Gustafsson at UFC 165? Even worse, would he even have had the speed and athleticism to defeat Shogun Rua to claim the belt initially at UFC 128? It's entirely possible that the answer to all of these questions is 'yes', but the truth is we'll never know, casting doubt on his true ability.

Before we start to completely dismiss his career as drug-enhanced, it is worth considering the current defence being put forward by his team. Far from the farcical "dick pills" excuse mentioned earlier, the Jackson Winklejohn team have made the argument that Jones repeatedly tested negative throughout camp, and suggested that there would be no benefit of taking steroids the day before the fight, with the chemicals taking weeks to build up in a fighter's system and take effect.

I'm not naive enough to take this kind of thing at face value, and there is every chance that this is another cover up, but logically something doesn't add up. According to USADA's website, Jones has been tested 17 times since the agency was introduced in 2015, and bear in mind that he was out for a full year between July 2016 and July 2017 for his past indiscretion. Assuming Jones had been tested in the final few weeks ahead of the fight, there would have been no opportunity for the drug to make a difference, and with Jones already knowing the potential repercussions of a failed test first-hand, I struggle to see the pros for taking a steroid - particularly one that has also been proven to be picked up in USADA tests in the past!

Irrespective of this, the person I feel for most is Daniel Cormier, who was defeated so emphatically at UFC 214, and left unconscious and disconnected for some time afterwards. Should Jones be found guilty, he will have been severely damaged by a man who entered the Octagon having cheated to make himself more dangerous, something that could have had long-lasting effects for the remainder of his life. He's in a no-win situation, as stripping Jones of the title and returning it to Cormier would again put him in the position of being questioned as champion, having not won the belt in the Octagon.

Despite this, the statement released by DC in the hours following this news was admirable. Far from the point-scoring and trash-talking seen ahead of the fight, his reaction was perfectly reasonable and understanding. Rather than jumping to a conclusion, he made it clear that he felt that Jones was the better man on the night, and elected to hold off commenting further until the details were revealed.

After the euphoria of UFC 214, not all soap opera stories end happily, and short of something unusual, I can only realistically see one outcome to this one. In Jon Jones, the UFC had reclaimed a real draw, having lost the likes of Lesnar, Rousey and even McGregor in recent years, and in one moment, Jon Jones may have cost the UFC a legitimate PPV draw, and himself his entire career.

UFC Fight Night London: Does Adversity Breed Success?

Amidst a backdrop of widespread condemnation, the UFC rolled into London this weekend with, on the face of it, arguably its weakest card for many a year.

Following an explosive end to 2016 at UFC 207, this is an issue that the promotion has been battling for the whole first quarter of this year, but has only really come to a head in London. It’s no secret that the UFC struggles to build stacked cards in Europe, though why is anyone’s guess.

But the company seemingly hit a new low with its 2017 offering in the English capital when, after reportedly being unable to find a suitable opponent for Swedish slugger Alexander Gustafsson, it decided to bump its co-main of Jimi Manuwa/Corey Alexander to the headline bout. Not particularly inspiring, especially when you consider that the main event in the marquee London card last year was the ‘Fight of the Year’ contender between Michael Bisping and Anderson Silva.

If, like myself, you had bought a ticket before the card was even fully announced, you may have been forgiven for feeling a little disappointed. Looking down, it was hard to see where the draw would come, from the underwhelming co-main match-up between Gunnar Nelson and Alan Jouban, to the inevitably dull heavyweight collision of Tim Johnson and Daniel Omielanczuk. While British MMA pioneer Brad Pickett’s final fight added a little nostalgia value, the majority of the offering was nothing more than rising stars, covering Arnold Allen, Marc Diakiese, Brett Johns and Leon Edwards.

But if the fans thought they were struggling for value for money already, they hadn’t seen nothing yet. Just hours before the event itself, not one but two bouts were forcibly scrapped due to medical reasons, leaving the already slim card thinner than the two Octagon girls. With weight-cutting already under severe scrutiny, the struggles of Ian Entwistle and Tom Breese to cope with the pressures placed on their bodies will only further serve to shine a light on the issue. Indeed, immediately following the news, Entwistle announced his retirement from MMA, highlighting just how difficult this process is.

Perhaps surprisingly, the prelims started encouragingly. Lina Lansberg, fresh off her mauling at the hands of Cris Cyborg, got a narrow, and widely disputed, split decision win over Lucie Pudilova, while Scott Askham and Brad Scott put on, in my eyes at least, the fight of the night in a back and forth encounter. This was then punctuated by my highlight of the night – a thirty second KO of Teemu Packalen by rising lightweight prospect Marc Diakiese, including a cartwheel kick, a spinning wheel kick and then a huge overhand right, leaving the Finn jelly-legged and out cold on the mat. On this performance, there is no doubt that the Doncaster-born fighter can make good on his promise to the O2 Arena to go all the way to the top, though I’m sure he’ll have tougher competition than this.

However, if those in attendance felt that was to set the scene for the evening, we were very much mistaken. While the Edwards/Luque fight was entertaining in its technical and tactical battle, the goodwill built up by the early prelims was quickly eradicated by the heavyweight contest. I don’t care how glorious Tim Johnson’s handlebar moustache is, he puts on a boring fight!

At the risk of ripping off a famous Fatboy Slim song, the full 15 minutes were a case of punch, charge, recover, repeat, largely enabled by the lumbering Omielanczuk. The worrying thing is that both of these guys started proceedings inside the top 15 of the division, highlighting once again how in need of heavyweight talent the UFC is.

While Joe Duffy’s energetic dismantling of Reza Madadi and Arnold Allen’s scramble-fest against Makwan Amirkhani instilled a bit of life back into proceedings, it was very obvious that we had seen five consecutive, and rather dull, decisions as we entered the business end of the evening.

As a proud Northerner, I’m perhaps slightly biased, but I can honestly say that I was surprised by the abject lack of atmosphere in the O2 Arena before and during the Brad Pickett fight. Considering that this is supposed to be the final fight in the career of a legend of the London MMA scene, I had expected a raucous environment akin to the one I witnessed for Michael Bisping in his hometown title defence against Dan Henderson at UFC 204. Alas, the most excited the crowd got during the 14 minute fight was when a brawl broke out in the front rows of the seated section – over what I don’t know!

Nevertheless, it was sad to see ‘One Punch’ go out the way he did. While he argued an early stoppage, he was certainly badly hurt by Marlon Vera’s head kick, and the argument was there that he was not intelligently defending himself for the second hammer-fist. An emotional farewell speech later, Pickett fittingly left his iconic pork pie hat in the centre of the Octagon, bowing out with a respectable 25-14 record at the very highest level.

The crowd did wake up a little during the co-main, however, gamely joining in on the now famous Icelandic slow clap. Outside of Demian Maia, is there a more impressive jiu-jitsu practitioner than Iceland’s Gunnar Nelson? He absolutely bullied a game fighter in Alan Jouban, beating him to the punch and dominating him on the ground, before finishing the former model with a brutal guillotine choke. While this match-up was admittedly poor, surely Nelson has to be looking at a top five contender next time out – Lawler, Cerrone or Condit?

And if the co-main was one-sided, I’m not quite sure how to characterise the headliner. On paper an interesting match-up between a deadly striker in Jimi Manuwa and a respected wrestler in Corey Anderson, it could not have been much more of a mismatch. Having failed on a couple of takedown attempts and taken a brutal hook to the body, Anderson was left flat out on the floor by a huge left hand by the Brit at just three minutes, in a walk-off KO that Mark Hunt would have been proud of.

Certainly, Manuwa is living up to his reputation as one of the scariest knockout artists in the division (second behind Anthony ‘Rumble’ Johnson if you believe Joe Rogan), but has he done enough to secure a fight against the winner of Daniel Cormier and Rumble? If you’re going on legitimacy of contendership, absolutely, however there is the looming prospect of a Jon Jones return, and as we have seen from Georges St Pierre’s comeback, the new owners of the UFC value a returning star at a little more than a number one contender. And calling out David Haye? What is it with MMA fighters and boxers these days?  

Overall, UFC Fight Night London had its moments of quality, but these were often too fleeting and punctuated what was largely an underwhelming card. Not as good as last year, and certainly nowhere near UFC 204. It’s a shame, because the UK market for MMA is huge at the minute, with the Manchester event selling out in under six minutes, and there is a considerable opportunity for the UFC to expand. Bellator has looked to get into this with a comparatively stacked card in May, and with the current free agency debate, the UFC needs to demonstrate its strength in depth.

Put simply, the promotion needs to stop exposing just the same small roster of fighters for the European events. I’m not even going to look, but I’d be surprised if you could find an event in the region in the past few years that does not include one of these fighters in the main card: Andrei Arlovski, Michael Bisping, Gegard Mousasi, Stefan Struve, Jimi Manuwa, Alexander Gustafsson. I get that home fighters want to fight at their own events, and that’s fine, but make more events! Tickets are clearly selling, so the promotion needs to stop short-changing its loyal European fan-base and find a better balance between demand and supply.

The Octagon returns to Glasgow later this year, so there is hope, but I shan’t hold my breath.