Mark Hunt is pissed off that he was put inside the octagon with a guy that tested positive for steroids. It’s not the first time that Mark has put his health and career on the line, only to find out that his opponent was cheating and gaining an unfair and very dangerous advantage. It’s not even the first time that it’s happened since USADA came into play. That extra punching power at heavyweight is colossal, especially with such a huge weight range for the HW division. At HW, a guy could potentially have 30-40 extra pounds of muscle on you, whereas that would never happen in the light weight classes.
There’s been talk about a fighter’s union for years, but the UFC’s former owners were really not into the whole union thing. They’ve been at war with unions for years, especially since they fight hard to keep unions out of their casino business.
But it’s a new day for the UFC, and we can expect to see more and more changes as the sport takes further strides to attempt to legitimize itself in the mainstream.
Getting USADA on board to catch cheaters is the first big step, but it seems there are still some potential loopholes.
For example, Broke was able to bypass the 4 month testing requirement by simply not being signed to the UFC until right before his fight at UFC 200. This isn’t a special rule that only applies to Brock, it’s just what the rulebook says, but…
The UFC told Mark Hunt long before UFC 200 to prepare for a fight, so it seems they were trying to get Brock on board for a long time. By not officially announcing anything, and by waiting until the last minute, they missed out on a lot of opportunities to promote the fight, BUT they were also able to buy Brock some extra time before he had to take any drug tests.
Brock Lesnar returned to the Octagon at UFC 200 and had a darn good time, roughing up Mark Hunt.
At the end of the day, he still failed the drug tests, but by waiting until the last minute the UFC was able to give him every possible opportunity to pass. It’s totally reasonable for Mark Hunt to be mad about that because ultimately it looks pretty shady.
At the end of the day, Mark’s the one who put it all on the line to step inside that cage with Brock.
Here are some quotes from MarkHunt’s website that offer some insights into his thoughts about unionizing:
“The way I see it, the Brock Lesnar doping thing is just another reason why we need a fighter’s association,” Hunt said via phone interview. “These guys are just making up the rules as they go.
“First the Reebok thing, then Brock’s 4 month testing exemption. Conor gets pulled off a card for not going to a press conference that me or Brock didn’t go to anyway. Work that out. There’s probably a heap of others.”
On the UFC’s overall power and influence in MMA:
“You just have to look at how Ariel gets his media pass taken away cause he broke a story about Brock, then he gets it back when other media stood up for him and called out the UFC.” He said. “These guys are just making sh*t it up as they go.
This is probably what Vince McMahon looks like on the phone right now.
“Yet fighters refuse to support other fighters when they [expletive] us over.
“They say they are cleaning up the sport, yet I’ve risked my health two times against guys cheating since this USADA thing started. I was told Brock was gonna be tested when I took the fight, he comes in looking fricken juicy as hell and then I find out he’s popped after the PPV has already been sold.
Mark Hunt will face Brock Lesnar and, trust me, he’s far scarier than he looks. Photo by Sherdog.com.
“It’s ridiculous. The fact that they haven’t even bothered to make contact with me since all of this happened just proves they don’t care.
“I don’t even know how he made 265lbs that guy, he looked about 500kgs. I mean shucks, look at the pictures and tell me this guy passed the smell test that Jeff guy talks about. I mean even the other passport stuff, which is supposed to be important for testing, they woulda had none of that from Brock because of the exemption.
“If you ask me the whole point of the four month testing period should be to make sure someone doesn’t pop back in, juiced to the gills, and beat the crap out of the guys who are clean and have been clean and tested this whole time.
“I’m pretty sure all of this stuff is just there to look good for the sale if you ask me.”
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