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Talk about 15 minutes of fame.
Stephan Bonnar is apparently free to "take a shit" on the carpet of Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) President Dana White, which is how "American Psycho" described his shame for failing a drug test -- the second steroids strike during his tenure -- after getting tooled by Anderson Silva at UFC 153 in Oct. 2012.
Bonnar took the high-profile, non-title match on short notice, hoping the opportunity of a lifetime would resurrect his mixed martial arts (MMA) career. Bonnar, however, was creamed in round one and then, to add insult to injury, The Ultimate Fighter (TUF) 1 runner up was popped with performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs) in his system.
Once the Brazilian dust settled, Bonnar felt he "ruined" the relationship he formed with White and Co. inside and outside the Octagon, opting to keep quiet and fade into MMA retirement.
White was clearly upset, saying he was "bummed out" that Bonnar was not up front with him, but his disappointment didn't last too long. On the contrary, White announced that Bonnar -- along with Forrest Griffin, the first-ever TUF winner -- would be enshrined in the Hall of Fame this weekend (Sat., July 6, 2013), which features luminaries such as Randy Couture, Matt Hughes, Tito Ortiz and Chuck Liddell, among others.
The decision, which was met with disbelief in the case of Ortiz, was apparently made the moment Bonnar came out on the wrong side of a razor-thin split decision in TUF 1 Finale, an epic back-and-forth war with Griffin back in 2005 that White still, according to Yahoo!Sports.com, credits for helping the then-struggling organization break through to the mainstream.
His reasoning:
"Nobody knows more than me how much that fight meant. For us, that fight meant everything, and I never forget it."
It was a position in which the self-destructing Bonnar was fortunate to be in after almost getting kicked off the show.
White explains:
"Stephan Bonnar goes in [to the bathroom] and pretends he's taking a shower. Don't forget, guys: This was 2005 and this house was in the middle of the [expletive] desert in Southern Highlands. There was nothing there. This idiot climbs out the window pretending he's taking a shower and goes looking for a liquor store. He could have walked for four [expletive] days and never gotten to a liquor store. He comes back two hours later and climbs through the window again, where everybody is standing there waiting for him. I was going to kick him off the show. I was going to kick him off – and I didn't. Imagine if I had kicked Stephan Bonnar off the show that day, and him and Forrest never happened."
If my aunt had balls, she'd be my uncle. And if the judges who scored Bonnar's semifinal bout against Bobby Southworth on the show correctly -- one that he was lucky to win via split decision -- then perhaps the situation would be different.
Who know's, maybe I wouldn't be divorced, writing this right now and y'all would be reading a Wimbledon blog.
Regardless, White hammers home the significance:
"I don't think people realize, really, really realize, what that one fight meant to this sport and this company. I look at it as, I'm inducting Forrest, and Stephan goes with him. It wasn't just Forrest. Both of those guys took us to this next level. He's being inducted for that one fight that took this thing to the next level."
Hard to argue. And it's safe to assume Bonnar won't voice any objections now or never.
For more on the UFC Hall of Fame induction ceremony this weekend in Las Vegas, Nevada, as well as more about the significance of Forrest Griffin vs. Stephan Bonnar 1, click here.
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