Yair Rodriguez celebrates his victory over BJ Penn (not pictured) during the UFC Fight Night event at the at Talking Stick Resort Arena on January 15, 2017 in Phoenix, Arizona. (Photo by Christian Petersen/Getty Images)
Yair Rodriguez was suspended for six months back in December 2020 by UFC anti-doping administrator USADA
The talent-stacked featherweight division is witnessing some incredible fights and movement, reigned by an immovable force that is Alexander Volkanovski. Many have tried, and many have failed. Two of the best featherweights clash this weekend in an epic contest, when Brian Ortega and Yair Rodriguez cross paths.
Ortega has already had a shot at Volkanovski’s title once, and came the closest to dethroning the featherweight champion. But back in December 2020, Yair Rodriguez was suspended for six months by USADA.
Even though the Mexican fighter did not test positive for any banned substance, he was subject to suspension by USADA for being in violation of a rule in the anti-doping policy. Yair Rodriguez committed three Whereabouts Failures during a period of 12 months.
An important part of USADA’s testing program is the ability to test athletes without any advance notice in an out-of-competition setting. To maximize testing resources and minimize the burden on athletes, USADA has created a Registered Testing Pool (RTP) and a Clean Athlete Program (CAP).
As a member of the UFC’s Registered Testing Pool, Yair Rodriguez, and any fighter for that matter, is expected to respond to no-notice sample collections for the out-of-competition testing program.
The USADA took action, and released a statement to clarify the suspension,
“Like all UFC athletes, Rodriguez, 28, is a member of the UFC Registered Testing Pool and is therefore subject to certain Whereabouts responsibilities, which allow him to be located for testing. Accurate Whereabouts information is a crucial component of an effective out-of-competition testing program because it enables anti-doping organizations to conduct no-notice sample collections, which helps maintain effective doping deterrence and detection,”
The statement further read, “Rodriguez failed to update his Whereabouts information and was unavailable for testing at locations provided in his Whereabouts Filings on three occasions. He accrued a Whereabouts Failure in each of the first three quarters of 2020. The accumulation of three Whereabouts Failures within a 12-month period constitutes a policy violation under the UFC Anti-Doping Policy.”
Yair Rodriguez later addressed the situation by saying that fighters have an app on their phone. Every time they change locations they have to tell USADA. Rodriguez called himself a ‘Nomad’, and said he was not being professional, just losing track of updating his location.
Yair Rodriguez fought Jeremy Stephens in his hometown of Mexico City at UFC on ESPN+ 17. Fans expected fireworks, given the fighting style both fighters present, and Stephens left no stones unturned in preparation. However, the main event didn’t see past the 15 seconds mark of the first round, after Jeremy Stephens’s eye shut down due to an accidental poke by Yair.
Yair Rodriguez celebrates his victory over BJ Penn (not pictured) during the UFC Fight Night event at the at Talking Stick Resort Arena on January 15, 2017 in Phoenix, Arizona. (Photo by Christian Petersen/Getty Images)
Fans inside the arena blew a fuse, and things escalated pretty bad. They started hurling popcorn and beer after the fight was called off. Rodriguez flared up after the fight was cut short, and began pacing the octagon in agony.
Former UFC middleweight champion Michael Bisping was on commentary duty for the event. When he walked in to interview Rodriguez, the Mexican angrily roared at Bisping in his native language. Bisping tried to calm him down and calmly reacted by saying, ‘‘Hey, Relax..”
Recalling the incident on his Youtube channel ahead of Yair Rodriguez’ fight against Max Holloway, Bisping said,
“There you go, Max Holloway vs. Yair Rodriguez should be fun. I’ll be interviewing the winner… Last time I stepped into a cage with Yair Rodriguez was when he fought Jeremy Stephens down in Mexico City. The fight just started and sadly there was an eye poke and the fight got called off. Then a riot started and when we were there, I was commentating with Brendan Fitzgerald.
Fitzgerald gets under the desk and he was like Mike ‘come down here, there’s room for you… Anyway, when it all died down, I went into the cage and I went to talk to Yair Rodriguez. And he snapped at me in Spanish and he ended up ‘puta’. So I think he called me a little b***h. But it’s all good. We had a joke about it the other day. So fingers crossed, if I do interview him on Saturday, I don’t get abused,”
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