Sometimes, ex-UFC bantamweight champ Cody Garbrandt wonders what might have been had his longtime rival T.J. Dillashaw been caught doping before a knockout loss in 2017.

Had Dillashaw not been able to “regenerate” with erythropoietin (EPO), Garbrandt said, he might not have recovered from a first-round knockdown at UFC 217.

“But I know I’m the best in the world, drug free,” Garbrandt (11-3 MMA, 6-3 UFC) told reporters, including MMA Junkie, backstage at UFC on ESPN+ 13. “I’ve had over 40 tests from USADA, and there’s nothing that’s been illegal.”

The same can’t be said for Dillashaw, whose postive test for the banned endurance-enhancing drug set off a chain of revelations about the testing process for EPO and Garbrandt’s previous accusations against the now-stripped champion.

In 2018, Garbrandt publicly accused Dillashaw of using EPO. The accusation was borne out after Dillashaw flunked a post-fight drug test following a first-round TKO loss to flyweight champ Henry Cejudo in January.

Garbrandt raged after UFC officials revealed that the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency (USADA), which administrates its drug testing program, doesn’t always test for EPO because it’s cost prohibitive. The regulator also doesn’t keep all of its past samples because of the costs of storage, preferring to preserve samples deemed suspicious.

And while Dillashaw was tested for EPO in his fights against Garbrandt, John Lineker and Raphael Assuncao, Garbrandt said there shouldn’t be any exceptions in drug testing. He said any exceptions call the entire process into question.

“I stated back in 2017 at the press conference that I would like to do more invasive testing with it,” Garbrandt said. “We have to log in everywhere we go, we have to answer the door at 6 a.m., piss urine and blood and do work, write down every supplement we have. There should be no boundaries or picos or this or that. You either cheat or you don’t.

“We’re not in there shooting steroids up and getting big. They’re doing the EPO. They’re doing all that kind of (expletive) to cardio base. I knew that. I knew T.J. was on that, and that’s why I said I wanted more invasive testing. He’s been on it for five, six years, and that’s not the only thing he’s on. There’s a lot of other fighters that are on a lot of other (expletive), too.”

Garbrandt, who’s currently recovering from back-to-back KO losses, then proposed an idea familiar to critics of anti-doping controls. Rather than try to maintain the best system possible, he posited that the whole program should be thrown out, letting the chips fall where they may.

“If you’re going to draw a line on what we can do or how we can test – you can’t keep this sample, you can’t detect the EPO – then what are we getting tested for? Let it all be legal, and let’s all get juiced up and go in there and (expletive) each other up,” he said. “That’s ultimately what they want.”

The likelihood of that happening is close to zero. In fact, the UFC recently renewed its agreement with USADA, which has increased overall testing. The anti-doping agency recently touted 2018 figures that show more athletes are being caught cheating.

Garbrandt, meanwhile, tries not to dwell on the what-ifs. He sees a drug problem in MMA and believes there’s an easy fix. He’s still going to fight regardless of whether or not justice is served.

“I believe in karma, being a good person,” he said. “I can’t focus on what any other individual is doing. I can focus on being a good person, a good father and a good husband, getting back to the top and being a world champion. That’s what keeps me going.”

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