Jon "Bones" Jones, the interim UFC lightweight champion, has been pulled from the UFC 200 card after the U.S Anti-Doping Agency informed him of a potential doping violation. Jones allegedly tested positive for a banned substance on June 16th and although there is a review process, he'll be unable to compete on this Saturday's card.
After Conor McGregor was pulled from the UFC 200 main event, Jones vs Daniel Cormier was pencilled in as the top match on the card, but that honor will now go to Brock Lesnar vs. Mark Hunt.
"When you have the biggest, baddest fight card ever assembled, you know, it doesn't sting as bad when you lose a fight," White said. "But it stings real bad for Daniel Cormier. This is devastating to him, his family, and I'd like for him to fight another guy."
"I've worked really hard to prepare for this," Cormier said. "You take care of what you need to take care of. That's what I did. More than anything, it's really disappointing."
"I've trained hard and long," Cormier said. "If anybody would fight, I would fight. Why not? I understand the difficult task it would be to find me a fight on two days. I'm willing to fight up, put on some weight, 225, 220 [pounds]. I'll fight. It doesn't matter. I just can't fight a really big guy, because I've been shrinking my body."
It's important to note that even though Jones has never tested positive for performance enhancing drugs, he'll be slapped with a mandatory two-year suspension if that proves to be the case here.
[Via]