Brandon Rios Reportedly tests positive for a Post Pacquiao fight drug test

Brandon Rios Reportedly tests positive for a Post Pacquiao fight drug test

Brandon Rios has reportedly tested positive for a banned substance in his post-fight urine test after his bout last month with Manny Pacquiao.

Initial reports suggest that the substance is the drug methylexanamine, which is a dietary supplement, which it is believed, may have been used in order to help Rios make weight. The naturally bigger Rios traditionally struggles to make weight at 140lbs and 147lbs so many believe Rios may have been using the drug to help him make the weight against Pacquiao with whom his weight, and power, advantage would’ve been perhaps his one and only advantage.

The topic of drug and banned substance use in boxing, and sports in general, will be debated once again especially the severity of the punishment which can act as a deterrent.

The problem is that often the reward of gaining an advantage can outweigh the risk of finding a way to gain that (albeit unfair) advantage. The reward in Rios’ case is the chance to inflict a famous victory over arguably one of the greatest boxers of the modern era. The risk obviously is being caught, as he has been, and the subsequent punishment that this may bring.

The testing procedures however are far for perfect and thus there starts to develop a genuine possibility of having that advantage over your opponent and NOT getting caught. Imagine if Rios has knocked Pacquiao out. A second KO in a row after the brutal knockout inflicted by Juan Manuel Marquez. Only Pacquiao will know how much that loss, and in particular the manner of the loss, to Marquez effected him. We can only speculate what a loss to Rios in a similar fashion could’ve done to Pacquiao’s confidence and his career. Instead of talking about a record-breaking fight with Floyd Mayweather we instead could’ve been talking about Pacquiaos retirement.

The punishment does need to be more severe where it can be determined that the use of a substance was done with the primary aim of giving the fighter an unfair advantage against his opponent. Simply maintaining, as some do, that even if the perpetrator won he would most likely be subsequently caught and the “L” removed from his opponents record is not enough.

In 1983 Luis Resto beat Billy Collins Jr. The fight eventually cost Collins his life when he drove his car off a cliff 2 years later suffering from depression but more importantly suffering from the premature end of his career due to damage to his eyes sustained during the fight. After the fight it emerged that Resto’s trainer had removed padding from his gloves. Even though Resto’s trainer received a jail sentence and the decision was obviously overturned the damage had already been done to Collins. He was never the same again. Imagine if Rios has inflicted a Marquez like knock out on Pacquiao? Even if Rios had later been found out and the decision overturned what effect would that have had on Pacquaio?

Antonio Margarito was found out under similar circumstances having lined his hand wraps with a hardened object. He was found out before his fight with Shane Moseley while the wraps were being applied. Many however argue that he used a similar object in his fight against Miguel Cotto and once again, as with Collins, he was a sight to behold at the end of the fight. Never before had Cotto been bloodied like this and perhaps never will again. Margarito obviously argues that the illegal wraps were not used against Cotto but if he was using them against Moseley why wouldn’t he have done against Cotto? What lasting damage that fight has done to Cotto we’ll never really know but many have suggested that Cotto does seemed to get marked a lot more during fights than he used to and swells up more easily. Any form of such illegal manoeuvre to gain an advantage can cost a boxer more than just the fight, his record or even his career. It can cost him his life.

The ramifications of boxers stepping in the ring with one another with an illegal advantage are severe so the punishment that they receive when they are caught needs to be as severe.

-Ali Khan

UK Contributor for www.BehindTheGloves.com