Daniel Cormier is once again the UFC light heavyweight champion.
The UFC has officially stripped Jon Jones of the title after his fight against Cormier was overturned to a no contest by the California State Athletic Commission following a positive drug test for steroids.
Cormier made the announcement on “UFC Tonight” on Wednesday.
“Dana White called me today and he said if it’s a no contest, then the fight didn’t happen,” Cormier said. “If one of you guys would have missed weight, he would have won the fight, you still would have kept the belt. He said cause of that, the championship is getting returned to you. The fight is a no contest.
“If he cheated, he could not have fought and cheated and still won the fight. So once again I’m the UFC champion.”
The UFC also confirmed the news with a statement afterwards.
“UFC was informed Wednesday that the result of the UFC 214 bout between Jon Jones and Daniel Cormier on July 29 was overturned by the California State Athletic Commission. The ruling changes the Jones ‘win’ to a ‘no contest’ following a potential Anti-Doping Policy violation stemming from an in-competition sample collected after Jones’ weigh-in on July 28, 2017,” UFC officials said in the statement.
“As this was a title bout, Cormier will be reinstated as UFC light heavyweight champion.”
Jones remains under provisional suspension after both his ‘A’ and ‘B’ samples returned positive for the anabolic steroid Turinabol. Jones will still be afforded the opportunity to appeal the findings and his team has already stated that they believe he was the victim of a tainted supplement.
Jones faces up to a four year suspension as a repeat offender in the UFC’s anti-doping policy program after also testing positive last year and being handed a one-year suspension as a result.
As for Cormier’s spot as champion, he defended the obvious objections that he lost the fight to Jones by knockout because his opponent has now been proven as a cheater.
In addition to that, Cormier says that there are financial incentives to fight as champion rather than compete for a vacant title when he returns to action.
“Now people will stay stuff like you got handed the belt,” Cormier said. “He cheated and the reality is for me to say I don’t want this when I was going to be in the championship fight anyways, financially it’s just a big difference if I don’t fight as the champion as opposed to fighting for a vacant belt.”
