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By: Jamie Penick, MMATorch Editor-in-Chief
The Nevada Athletic Commission's decision not to levy any further fine towards Chael Sonnen, instead opting to suspend the already retired fighter for two years, is one that didn't sit well with all observers. That included some fighters who see the punishment as less a detriment to users as it is just another sign that the commission is only selectively harsh towards fighters.
One such name who thought the NAC was too lenient on Sonnen was longtime veteran and one-time UFC Title challenger Josh Koscheck, who commented on what he felt was a relative lack of punishment from the commission on Twitter.
NSAC was way to easy on Chael today. They say let’s clean up the sport? Then they need to start attacking these cheaters with big fines!
Penick's Analysis: I'm a little in the middle on this. I think it's ridiculous he received nothing in the way of a fine given what others have received for much lesser infractions. At the same time, I'm not in agreement with the fines that have been handed down in the past to some fighters. In this instance, a $10-$20K fine probably would have sufficed at a maximum when he was facing upwards of $250K, and certainly is more than the nothing he received. I wouldn't have wanted to see the $80K they slapped Nick Diaz with for marijuana, but at the same time, it's this same commission that took $80K from Diaz for weed, a miniscule amount at that, which wouldn't have even registered a positive test under their current threshold. Now I don't think that's what Sonnen should have gotten here, I'm not at all advocating for that, but there's a massive disconnect when the book was thrown at Diaz for an infraction that isn't even an infraction anymore, while Sonnen essentially receives no meaningful commission punishment given he had already announced his retirement. It's not the message the assistant attorney general wanted the commission to send, and for fighters like Koscheck and others, they feel it's not really a message that brings any meaning to their testing efforts.
[Josh Koscheck art by Cory Gould (c) MMATorch.com]
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Jamie Penick, editor-in-chief
(mmatorcheditor@gmail.com)
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