Jon Jones’ reputation took another big hit back in August when it was revealed that he failed a drug test the day before locking horns with Daniel Cormier at UFC 214. The former lightweight champion and front contender for GOAT status had previously been pulled from UFC 200 the week of the event after the estrogen blockers clomiphene and letrozole were found in his system. This time it was a straight up anabolic steroid, turinabol, that was detected.
With Jon unable to fight and facing a four year suspension for his second offense under the USADA testing regime, he’s putting his efforts into making a strong case that he’s innocent of wrongdoing. One part of that apparently involved a polygraph, also known as a lie detector test. Sources within the UFC leaked the results to MMAFighting.com, revealing Jones answered questions regarding whether he knowingly took turinabol and managed to pass.
Unfortunately for Jones, neither the courts nor USADA recognize polygraphs as legitimate defenses anymore. But you get the feeling this is more for us than USADA (although USADA seems to weigh intent heavily, so who knows for sure). If you happened to be on the fence regarding this latest sketchy Jones moment, maybe the polygraph will push you towards thinking he’s innocent. Maybe those rumors of Jones simply taking tainted cocaine are true. Or maybe it was another tainted supplement, which is kinda sorta what Jones claimed the last time he failed a drug test.
Daniel says the only reason I defeated him the first time is because I must have been on steroids, wonder what his excuse will be this time pic.twitter.com/HMCFQBoBR4
— BONY (@JonnyBones) July 21, 2017
There does seem to be a lot of evidence that points to accidental ingestion of the banned substance this time around. USADA tested Jones heavily leading up to and after his fight at UFC 214, and all the tests except the one on July 28th came back clean. The UFC’s go-between man with USADA, vice president of athlete health and performance Jeff Novitzky, said as much in a recent podcast with Joe Rogan.
“It would not make a lot of sense for an individual, a UFC athlete who knew, especially a champion or contender like Jon Jones, who knew ‘Hey, I’m tested quite regularly in the program,’ would not make a lot of sense that (turinabol) would be your drug of choice if you were intentionally trying to cheat,” he said. “USADA did another test on Jon after his positive test and he was negative. Who knows where it plays out, but certainly on the surface of things, I have said, with that type of information out there, it wouldn’t indicate intentional use.”
But there’s a certain level of dishonesty that’s been going on with Jones that makes any of these declarations of innocence hard to swallow. For years Jones put forward the facade of a family man with deep religious convictions. Meanwhile, insiders knew him more as a hard partying cocaine hoover. Jones claimed his previous UFC 200 drug test failure was a result of tainted ‘dick pills’, but when USADA looked into the training partner who had given Jon the pills, they found he had also ordered clomiphene at the same time. A suspicious person might go so far as to suggest the dick pills were a cover just in case Jones was caught.
The questionable moments go back even further. There was Jones’ unusual testosterone to epitestosterone ratio leading up to his first fight with Daniel Cormier back in 2015. Then there’s the widely discussed story of Jones allegedly hiding under the cage at his gym when a commission employee showed up for a random drug test. Jones denies this ever happened, but he’s been so dishonest regarding past scandals that it’s hard to believe him, even when the facts do line up with what he says in this latest case.
And that’s a problem not even a polygraph will solve.
