The Nevada Athletic Commission on Wednesday unanimously voted to mirror the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency’s punishment of Bobby Green, suspending him for six months. He will be able to compete on Nov. 16.
Green is also required to pay $326 in attorney’s fees and will be required to submit clean drug tests 30, 15 and 3 days from his next fight in Nevada. He faced a potential suspension of between nine and 24 months for a first-time offender and a 15-30 percent fine of his scheduled pay. But the commission opted for a six-month suspension in a settlement agreement with the UFC lightweight.
Green was flagged by the UFC’s anti-doping partner after a May 16 out-of-competition urine test came back positive for “the presence of an anabolic androgenic steroid of exogenous origin,” USADA stated this past month in issuing a six-month suspension. As a result, Green was pulled from his UFC 276 fight with Jim Miller. NAC attorney Joel Bekker said Green’s sample “reflected the presence of the value statistically of administration of anabolic androgenic steroids.”
Green in September revealed he had run afoul of USADA, explaining that he’d taken the banned substance DHEA after watching a video by Dr. Eric Berg, a popular and controversial health educator and chiropractor based in Virginia. Although UFC fighters are required to complete educational material on substances prohibited by USADA and the dangers of over-the-counter supplements, Green said he wasn’t aware DHEA was prohibited and purchased it at Walmart.
The veteran UFC lightweight said he was advised not to disclose his positive test, believing he would get a longer suspension. He accepted full responsibility for his actions, saying “I was a jackass. I’m the one that made the mistake. I take all responsibility. I ruined my situation.”
Additionally, the commission extended the temporary suspension of Elizeu Zaleski dos Santos pending a formal hearing into a disciplinary complaint filed against him. Dos Santos in September revealed a one-year USADA suspension for the banned substance ostarine. He blamed a tainted supplement on the positive and later accepted the punishment, according to USADA.
Ostarine has been at the center of several tainted supplements cases adjudicated by USADA, with several fighters receiving reduced terms after they linked the supplements to the banned substance. Dos Santos, who withdrew from a UFC Vegas 51 fight with Mounir Lazzez, said he did just that.
