Following his retirement in 2022, Donald Cerrone has admitted to using performance enhancing drugs in order to recover from lingering injuries.
Now, at the age of 41, he has recovered from his years of knocks and believes he is fresh and ready to make a return to the octagon. He has fought in MMA 48 times as a professional, and is keen to make it an even 50 with two more outings.
UFC President Dana White is one of the many critics of his plan, shaking his head at the prospect when asked during a recent press conference. And now it seems that ‘Cowboy’ can add another doubter to his list.
Who is Dana White? All you need to know about the CEO and President of the UFC Donald Cerrone reveals plan to fight two more times after getting off steroids
Former UFC lightweight title contender Donald Cerrone announced in a video on social media earlier this week that he is expecting to return to action for one more run. He wants to compete twice more, so that his professional career clocks in at an even 50 fights.
Competing since the WEC days, he has naturally picked up a number of injuries which have stuck with him throughout his career. And in order to combat those ailments, he has been taking a number of banned substances during his retirement.
He now must get clean and return a number of negative tests in order to be cleared to fight again, which he noted in his Instagram post. “I want to go back and get two more fights. I retired, I told you I was gonna get my hair done and getting on steroids,” Cerrone began.
“The number 50 has been sitting in my mind for a while. Working with transcend the last two years, taking TRT and a bunch of peptides now we’ve got a protocol.
“For all you people that say, ‘Oh what if you get on it, you can’t ever come off?’ well, I now have to come off and p*** clean, fight in a few months, so watch this.”
Daniel Cormier not keen on Donald Cerrone’s comeback ‘loophole’
However, the lightweight’s fellow UFC legend Daniel Cormier is not so sure that the plan makes complete sense from an ethical standpoint. He reckons that the vast improvements to physique that Cerrone has enjoyed as a result of his drug use give him an unfair advantage, even after coming off his cycle.
“The one thing about ‘Cowboy,’ is that it’s very refreshing to watch how open he’s been with all of this,” Cormier said on his YouTube channel. “He never lied. He never lied about what he was doing, what he was going to do, and how he was going to apply it to his life, and I’m all for a guy that has personal goals.
“But at the end of the day, for years now, he’s been openly using steroids. I like Donald now, but it doesn’t matter what I feel about him as a person, as a buddy, or whatever it is our relationship is today, I don’t quite know what it is, but he’s not been clean.
Photo by Chris Unger/Zuffa LLC via Getty Images
“And even if he can come back, take tests, pass those tests, for him to get back, he has to do all of those things and all those enhancers to allow for him to feel like he can compete at that level again. So he would test clean, but isn’t that just a loophole?
“Isn’t it just a loophole like with the guys, when they get hurt, they get out of the testing pool? They recover from the injury, then they re-enter the testing pool. It’s not wrong. It’s not illegal. But is it right?
“Because you truly have been enhanced to get to where you are and how you feel, and feel good enough to come back and fight in the elite organization of the UFC. To me, it doesn’t feel right.”
Dana White is ‘not a fan’ of Donald Cerrone’s return plans
Regardless of how Cormier feels, Cerrone likely faces an uphill battle in getting back to competition. He lost his last six before hanging up the gloves, and UFC president Dana White is one outspoken critic of his plan to return.
“I hate it, I hate it, love him, hate that,” White told media this week after learning of Cerrone’s plan. “He retired, for what? What’s left to prove? If you want to make money, let’s figure something else out. I hate it. When guys retire, they retire for a reason. They retire because they know it’s over, they know it is.
“Not just this sport but any professional sport, is hard to walk away from. Not just the money, that’s obviously a very hard part of it, but the feeling of walking out of that tunnel, the feeling of getting in the cage and the place is packed.”
Who is Dana White? All you need to know about the CEO and President of the UFC
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