There’s apparently been enough haters grumbling about USADA’s “exoneration” of Nate Diaz earlier this week being unsubstantiated and suspect that Chael Sonnen, former UFC star and steroid literate athlete, has a message for the remaining doubters.
“I sat in the wrong seat,” says Sonnen, referring to PED use. “I know how this game is played. I know the words that are used. I know how the body looks. Nate and performance enhancing [drugs]? That’s just not a reality.”
Baffled that anyone could have looked at Diaz and seen a chemically enhanced fighter, Sonnen applauds the “BMF” for his “genius” handling of the UFC and USADA drama, which Diaz exposed himself after being told by the organizations to keep it quiet. The move forced USADA and the UFC to move quicker into investigation and exoneration that usual, preserving the upcoming UFC “BMF Belt” faceoff between Diaz and Jorge Masvidal at Madison Square Garden next week.
“I can’t give him full credit for being a brilliant guy, because he does not have a strategy and a plan ahead of time…but Nate Diaz was put in a [poor] position with USADA,” explains Sonnen, detailing how suspected PED use is handled in the UFC. “They start out by you getting a notification. They don’t really point any fingers, they just let you know ‘we’ve got an abnormal test, and now we need to begin to find out how and why.’ That can take a period of time.
Nate’s looking at it going ‘You need me in ten days. You want sixty days…but I get destroyed in that process. So you go do your tests, but you do them now. You stay open late, you bring in better experts, and you do it now.’ It was smart.”
You can watch Uncle Chael’s full rant on the subject here:
USADA and the UFC cleared Diaz on October 25, having found therapeutically negligible amounts of the substance LGD-4033 in a tainted vegan vitamin supplement Diaz had been taking.
