Increase Penalties For Confirmed PED Use In Boxing

It ruins what was an incredible night of boxing, yet another fight tainted by cheating allegations. The mesh of styles couldn’t have been any better. It pitted Cruz’s volume versus Romero’s power, and both women slugged it out from the onset. Even more impressive is that neither let their foot off the gas despite fighting in Aguascalientes, MX, which is more than 6,000 feet above sea level. Unfortunately, all of that has been overshadowed by the fact that Cruz received extra assistance on her route to not winning.

Cruz Isn’t The Only One

It’s one thing to test positive for a potent performance-enhancing drug, and it’s another to cheat and still come up short. At the bare minimum, if you have a PED in your system, you should win before getting caught. If you fail a drug test and either lose or fight to a draw, the punishment should be double the norm because of the embarrassment alone.

Mexico’s Rodolfo Orozco tested positive for a banned substance following his September 24 defeat to Conor Benn, who has also been in the headlines for failing multiple drug tests.

Fernando Vargas was knocked out by Oscar De La Hoya in their September 2002 junior middleweight world title fight and tested positive for stanozolol in his post-fight urine test. Two months later, Vargas was suspended for nine months and fined $100,000. Based on this example, Cruz should be suspended for no less than 18 months.

Despite taking anabolic steroids, former German heavyweight world title contender Mariusz Wach was on the receiving end of a one-sided beating at the hands of then-unified world heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko in November 2011. The German Boxing Federation subsequently handed him a one-year suspension. However, Wach wasn’t done walking down the wrong path. After getting sliced, diced, and stopped by Alexander Povetkin in the 12th round of their November 2015 bout, Wach tested positive for a banned substance again.

Former lightweight world champion Brandon Rios lost nearly every round to Manny Pacquiao when they fought in their November 2013 welterweight showdown in Macau. Unfortunately for Rios, he tested positive for the banned stimulant methylhexaneamine, which is commonly used as a dietary supplement but is also a performance-enhancing substance, in his post-fight drug test. Rios was given a relatively light suspension of five months.

Former super middleweight titleholder Lucian Bute tested positive for the substance ostarine, the same drug that Ryan Garcia tested positive for last month, after his draw against then-titleholder Badou Jack in April 2016. Once the results came in, Bute was disqualified and fined $50,000 by the Washington, D.C. Boxing and Wrestling Commission.

Additional Punishment Necessary, But Won’t Fix Everything

Punishments for performance-enhancing drug use in boxing are too weak in general. While heavier penalties are essential to mitigating PED use, they won’t necessarily fix the problem because, at present, the users are often ahead of the testers, and the distance between them continues to grow. With today’s innovatory micro-dosing techniques, traces of performance-enhancing drugs usually leave a fighter’s body within one to two days. It’s very difficult to catch a fighter in the act today for that reason, and soft punishments only incentivize people to continue sliding down the slippery slope.

The curious case of Jarrell “Big Baby” Miller is what can happen when you’re too lenient. The former heavyweight title contender practically had an entire pharmaceutical arsenal in his system in April 2019 when he was preparing to fight then-unbeaten unified heavyweight world champion Anthony Joshua . He bombed four VADA-administered random drug tests for three different banned substances — GW1516, human growth hormone, and EPO — in just a few days. Despite having enough juice to start his own orange grove, the WBA suspended Miller for only six months. 14 months later, Miller tested positive for GW1516 again and was suspended for two years before he was set to headline a Top Rank on ESPN card at MGM Grand in Las Vegas against Jerry Forrest.

Hold Those In Power Accountable

Why is it so difficult to devise a solution for something that seems so egregiously simple to fix? Because a majority of boxing’s power brokers are full of it. They pretend to when it’s a fighter on an opposing platform or network, but they don’t bat an eye when it’s their own fighter.

Arum signed Miller to a co-promotional deal nine months after he failed four drug tests. The 35-year-old has failed six drug tests dating back to 2014. Eddie Hearn once called for Canelo Alvarez to be banned for life from boxing after he twice tested positive for clenbuterol. Two years later, he was promoting his fights. In recent weeks, Hearn demanded that the aforementioned Garcia face a lifetime ban as well after his positive ostarine test. The 25-year-old Garcia, of Victorville, California, dropped Devin Haney , who is promoted by Hearn, three times en route to a majority decision win on April 20 at Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York. Furthermore, Hearn has staunchly defended Benn despite his two positive tests for clomiphene.

Will Hearn promote Garcia in the future if the stars align?

Probably.

Boxing is a mess and will continue to be, but we can make some improvements, and it begins by punishing those who use performance-enhancing drugs more seriously. In the meantime, we will do our best to hold those accountable who enable this behavior to continue.