UFC Releases Official Statement On Wanderlei Silva NSAC Licensing ‘Issues’
UFC 175 hit yet another bump in the road yesterday, as did Wanderlei Silva’s street cred apparently. The Pride FC legend backed down from his long standing grudge match with Chael Sonnen, and was promptly replaced by surging middleweight and fellow Brazilian Vitor Belfort. The reason behind ‘The Axe Murderer’ pulling out? He failed to get licensed by Nevada following a missed drug test.
In an absolutely bizarre twist of events, Wanderlei Silva has been removed from the card that Vitor Belfort was removed from for (allegedly) the same reason, only to be replaced by ‘The Phenom’ after the date has been moved from May to July. So how about some clarification guys? Well, UFC CEO Lorenzo Fertita has released an official statement to UFC.com:
“Due to issues related to Wanderlei Silva’s licensing in the state of Nevada, the UFC was forced to seek a replacement opponent to face Chael Sonnen at UFC 175 on Saturday, July 5 in Las Vegas. Former UFC champion Vitor Belfort has accepted the fight with Sonnen, subject to Belfort receiving a license to compete from the Nevada Athletic Commission.”
It seems like the UFC is in a whole hot mess now that TRT has gone, or perhaps there is something shadier at play here. Either way, Belfort steps in as replacement for Silva, or does he? The fact remains that Belfort has not actually received his clearance to fight in Nevada, as Fertitta told ESPN.com:
“From our understanding, he’s said he’s off the therapy 100 percent, I know he’s voluntarily done testing every week and every test has come back normal. He is going through the process of submitting an application to Nevada and, based on the criteria we’ve seen for other fighters [who were on TRT], he’s no different. He should be eligible to be licensed in my opinion.”
I may not be the first to say this, but the whole situation with TRT and steroid abuse in MMA is still as big and stinks as bad as when the whole shit storm started. I wouldn’t like to hear that Silva has been juicing after all these years of being apparently clean, but I can find no other reason for him to no-show a drug test.
I pray that I’m wrong as we await both a statement from Wandy, and the news that Belfort is licensed to fight in Nevada again.
