Sean O’Malley Opens Up On Recent USADA Struggles
24-year-old “Sugar’ Sean O’Malley is one of the brightest prospects in the UFC today.
However, O’Malley was met with some controversy when he tested positive for a banned substance prior to a scheduled bout at UFC 229 last October. The United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) caught traces of ostarine in his system, subsequently handing him a six-month suspension.
The ordeal was determined to have been caused by a contaminated supplement. Speaking to Sirius XM’s “MMA Tonight” recently, O’Malley opened up on the recent struggles. He first talked about the backlash he received from fans after the news initially hit (via MMA Junkie):
“It was hard,” O’Malley said. “I remember the first couple of nights, I would just kind of tear up thinking, like, damn – because a lot of people, you look at Instagram, social media, you see people calling you (expletive) whatever.
“And you’re not supposed to look at the comments. I’m pretty good about not looking at the comments, and there was more positive than there was negative, but there can be 50 positives and one negative, you kind of latch on to that negative comment.
“So that kind of sucked, but then I remembered, the people that are commenting on that, they’re hurting on the inside. They’re depressed, they’re sad. People that do that are already kind of going through their own (expletive). So it made sense that people are like that.”
A Learning Experience
Although the experience was a negative one, O’Malley was able to take some positives out of it as well:
“It was good, though. I feel I got to learn a bunch about myself and kind of not identify as a fighter as much,” O’Malley said. “I’m not just a fighter. So it was good. Everything happens for a reason. It all turned out to be OK.”
Finally, O’Malley addressed the notion that he was taking “steroids.” The 135-pounder cleared things up and explained exactly what ostarine is and what it does:
“People, everyone thinks it’s steroids – people are saying I got caught doing steroids,” O’Malley said. “And what ostarine is a SARM (selective androgen receptor modulator, a PED that falls under ‘other anabolic agents’), it’s not a steroid.
“What (ex-champ T.J. Dillashaw) got caught for, that’s a (expletive) cheat. You can’t fake that. But that’s what people think I got in trouble for, the same kind of stuff. And no, that’s not even – mine was, I didn’t take anything.
“So it sucks getting tested by USADA now because it’s (expletive) stressful. Every time I see them at the gym I’m like, ‘God, I didn’t take anything last time when I failed the test, so what is it going to be this time?’”
