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Feb. 4, 2015 - Louder with Crowder
07:18
Chael Sonnen on Anderson Silva's Positive Steroid Results || Louder With Crowder
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Your longtime rival, Anderson Silva, and you're a gentleman.
You don't need to play the gentleman card.
There are not enough people listening here.
Just tested positive now for two banned steroids.
What do you make of that?
There's a lot of speculation going on.
What was your initial reaction when you heard it?
Well, just to put it in perspective for everybody that maybe doesn't follow the news on Anderson as you're speaking of, but we're about 12 hours into this whole thing.
So my opinion and your opinion, we need to reserve the right to change our opinion when we're confronted with New evidence, which is certainly going to happen as this thing continues on.
But, you know, look, there's two sides to this here.
There's two parts of it, at least.
First off, and again, quick timeline for everybody.
Anderson Silva had what's known as a compound fracture in his leg.
His leg snapped, meaning the bone had a clean break in half.
The only thing that kept his shin and his foot...
Connected to his body was his skin.
And as graphic as that sounds, it's very relevant to this.
Now, Anderson has an obligation, a moral obligation to himself to put his health first.
He needs to do whatever he can to repair that leg.
I think we can all stipulate to that, whether it's free market or black market.
If it helps his leg, even if he's got a lean on side, it's good for him.
However, the second part of it is sport.
There are rules within the sport, and they have to be followed no matter what.
It's real black and white, and you don't often get to come to the table and go, well, yeah, but there is a reason for that.
You don't get to do that.
It sounds as though he took something that's banned.
It sounds as though it's an illegal steroid, and he's going to have to answer for that.
So it's a little bit of a two-part thing.
Well, hold on.
One second.
Go ahead.
Because you just mentioned something that you and I have talked about.
I've heard you mention before a lot of people don't understand, right?
And we'll get into the fact because a lot of people will say, well, Chiel can't compliment us.
He's a hypocrite.
And we'll get into that.
But difference between a banned substance and an illegal steroid.
What he was taking, to the best of my understanding, at least one of those substances, was an illegal steroid.
Am I right, wrong?
And what's the difference?
According to what he's accused of, yes, he had, I believe it was two things in his system.
I believe they are both illegal steroids, to my understanding.
In America, he came from South America.
Again, there could be some conversation on laws there, but by our standards and my understanding, yes, that's correct.
One thing I will say, having read up on the drugs that Anderson did use, you know, one of those substances, if you look at it, actually one of its symptoms, one of the side effects, is that it can cause overcalcification.
It can actually cause bones to become weaker and more prone to breaking.
Did you know that?
No, I hadn't heard that.
And that's where you have all of the people speculating.
And again, it is speculation.
You have a bunch of mouth breathers who've never hit an armbar in their life on Sure Dog, acting like they're now medical experts or biochemists.
But that is an actual side effect of that one drug that he had taken, which sort of makes it interesting.
I know, listen, you hate to ever drag someone's name through the mud.
Obviously, you've had some things happen, but it is a little bit fun as the news unfolds, let's be honest.
I'll tell you this about myself.
I was asked that too.
As soon as you test positive for something, people will want to say it was over your whole career.
And my response is that's fair.
That's a fair statement.
If you get hit with something, it runs you all the way back in time.
Right.
The reality is, as science and medicine change, you're constantly taking new things.
Are they within the rules or not?
I think that's all a good question.
Nobody's totally clear on what these rules are.
I don't think you or I knew, prior to Anderson testing positive, how to pronounce these substances, let alone were they allowed or not.
So you kind of learn as you go, but I do think that's a fair statement.
I don't think it helps a guy to ever come out and go, no, no, no, this was a one time, or man, they just caught me out of bed.
Call it what it is, man.
You took it, you got caught in the end.
And that's what happened.
We'll see how Anderson handles it, but I think when somebody, at least for me, when somebody tried to say things, even if it wasn't accurate, I think I still deserve it.
If you test positive and somebody wants to run that back all the way to when I started my career at nine years old, I don't think that guy's wrong.
Do you think Anderson was on something when you fought him?
I can tell you...
I can tell you on the substance issues, the rules get very blurred, and I'll tell you why.
They have something now called out-of-competition testing.
The rule used to be, and the rule when I started and came through, and one of the problems I had was not adapting to the changes, but it used to just be in-competition, meaning what's in your system on fight night.
Time mattered.
If you were to come in and go, hey, listen, I gotta tell you guys, when I was in high school, I did, and then fill in the blank, they go, oh, we don't care.
You go, well, bad news.
When I was in college, I did it again.
They go, oh, we don't care.
So right off the bat, you understand time does matter.
There is a time period of which all is forgiven.
The confusion has come in, what is that time period?
And I accept that these are the rules and we must operate within them.
I do believe there's a conversation to be had that you can't just ban all medication from a person.
A person does not have...
Hold on one second.
...between health and sport.
I hate to do this.
But the question was, do you believe, do you think...
Now, if someone holds a gun to your head, do you think Anderson had used before?
Or do you think this was a one-time deal?
When you fought him, do you think he was on something?
If you have to guess.
I can't answer with a yes or no, Stephen, because here's why.
Here's why.
If you're saying that a guy never took a banned substance in his life, that's a silly statement, particularly in the context that you and I just established, that Tylenol, caffeine, these things are all banned substances.
But what about these substances that he was taking?
I really don't know, man.
I can tell you this on Anderson Silva.com.
The human body doesn't get better with age.
That's reality.
We start to decline as humans and particularly as athletes right around 25 years old.
If you're real lucky, you might push that to 27 or 28.
The good news is science and medicine have come along and decided the world does not belong to 18 to 25 year olds, but that you can extend your career beyond that.
So if you're asking me if he took something, there's two tests that you take, Stephen.
The first test is not The urine drug test.
The first test is the visual.
When a guy takes his t-shirt off and gets into the ring or steps on the scale, you look at him.
If a guy got better with time, you can't do that on your own.
Anderson Silva's body doesn't appear to have changed at all.
So, a reasonable person would conclude that whatever he was on now, he was on before, but there's no evidence to support that.
So, that ticked me off.
Again, Chris is a good friend of mine.
He trained me.
We were partners on Stars Earned Stripes.
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