On Wednesday morning in Las Vegas, UFC executives are expected to stand up in a ballroom at Red Rock Casino and announce, well, something to do with drug testing and the future of anti-doping efforts in MMA’s most prominent organization.

Exactly what that something will be is still unclear, but according to UFC President Dana White it will be a frank conversation to address “all the things that have happened lately, and what we’re going to do, and what’s going to happen from here on out.”

Ask U.S. Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart what the UFC should do, and he’ll tell you it’s “really a no-brainer,” especially for an organization that’s been plagued by bad news about failed drug tests of late.

“They’re at a critical crossroads, I think, where the sport potentially dies on the vine if you don’t address the problem in a serious fashion,” Tygart told MMAjunkie. “I think they should do what 400-plus sport organizations around the world have done … which is to adopt the world anti-doping (WADA) code as its policy that applies from the top down.”

According to several sources who spoke with MMAjunkie on the condition of anonymity, that’s exactly what the UFC was close to doing as recently as late last year. But after inviting proposals from several different agencies, including USADA and the Voluntary Anti-Doping Agency (VADA), the UFC eventually backed away from a promise to institute its own year-round testing program, which White said the UFC itself had “no business” doing.

So what stopped it? According to sources with knowledge of those internal discussions, one concern was that the UFC couldn’t afford such an extensive program, and in more ways than one.

First, there was the actual cost of testing some 400 athletes all over the globe, which was likely to edge into the millions of dollars. There was was also the fear that if too many stars were caught using and subsequently suspended, the UFC would find itself with both a public black eye and a lack of big-name draws, neither of which it could afford after an injury-plagued year of cancellations and declining revenues.

The irony is that, in a lot of ways, that’s what it ended up with, anyway. With UFC light heavyweight champion Jon Jones testing positive for cocaine in an out-of-competition test prior to his title defense at UFC 182, and former middleweight champion Anderson Silva testing positive for steroids prior to his UFC 183 bout against Nick Diaz (who also tested positive for marijuana after the fight), the UFC has found itself at the center of exactly the sort of doping controversy it had hoped to avoid.

Add in welterweight contender Hector Lombard, who, as we learned last week, tested positive for steroids at UFC 182, and you have a major perception problem for the sport’s biggest promoter, not to mention a growing list of athletes who are likely to be unavailable once the Nevada State Athletic Commission hands out suspensions.

If the UFC had nabbed those fighters using its own testing program, at least it could claim to be spearheading the effort to clean up the sport. Instead, it finds itself in reactive mode, searching for an appropriate response to the spate of bad doping news.

But instituting a year-round, out-of-competition drug testing program isn’t as simple as signing a check. As VADA President Margaret Goodman explained, paying an agency to collect the samples and run the tests is only part of the issue.

“The results-management part, that is the tough part for (the UFC),” Goodman said. “We wanted them to develop a written protocol for how they would handle adverse results – missed tests, positive tests – prior to the program commencing. The thing we don’t do is adjudicate. That would be up to the organization.”

According to Goodman, VADA submitted its proposal for a testing program this past fall at the UFC’s request, but heard “nothing at all” in response. The program called for using certified collection officers and WADA-accredited labs to test every fighter under contract at random, unannounced intervals. It also called for fighters to keep the UFC apprised of their whereabouts for testing purposes, similar to what Olympic athletes are required to do, and for fighters to complete educational webinars on a variety of drug and supplement-related topics.

The cost for all this, according to Goodman? A mere $3,250 per fighter, per calendar year. With roughly 400 fighters on the roster at any given time, that would add up to about $1.3 million a year.

“But look at what it costs to not do it,” Goodman said. “The value you lose, the suspensions and the fighters that then can’t fight, long-term that all costs you a heck of a lot more.”

That’s a sentiment echoed by USADA’s Tygart, who said his program’s estimated cost would vary depending on the number of fighters and frequency of tests, but, he added, the UFC “can’t afford not to do it.”

“Whatever the number is, and it’s certainly not at a level that would be cost-prohibitive, because 400 sports have done it and continue to do it on a daily basis, they have to remember that ultimately the integrity of the sport and the health and safety of the competitors is what gives this any market value,” Tygart said. “As we’ve seen with the Olympics, if you do this you’ll see that the brand, the credibility of the brand, and ultimately the money-making capability of the brand, that will flourish. People don’t want to pay to see drug-infested competition.”

Then again, if the WADA code were implemented in full for UFC fighters, it might come as a shock to many. An update to the code that took effect on January 1 calls for a four-year ban in the event of an athlete’s first failed drug test.

As Goodman pointed out, “for a lot of fighters, that could be half their careers.”

“You’ve got to weigh all that,” Goodman said. “You want it to be a deterrent, but really what you want is for the fighters to recognize that they’ve got to compete clean. That involves testing and punishment, but it also involves education.”

After announcing it was scrapping its original plan for an enhanced testing program of its own, the UFC initially said it would solve the problem by giving more money to athletic commissions. That is, in fact, what it essentially did by paying for enhanced testing efforts at the request of the NSAC.

The problem, anti-doping experts say, is that most state athletic commissions aren’t equipped to deal with all the facets of the problem, from collection to testing to adjudication.

“This is a sophisticated, scientific world,” Tygart said. “You need experienced prosecutors who know the ins and outs and know how athletes are going to attempt to defeat the process and also how they’ll attempt to escape consequences when they do test positive.”

According to Goodman, who worked as a ringside physician for the NSAC for many years, it’s also not a job that state athletic commissions should even be tasked with, since most lack the expertise and the man-power to handle drug testing on top of all the other regulatory duties they’re tasked with.

“An athletic commission’s primary role shouldn’t have to be drug testing,” Goodman said. “Sadly, if you look at the commission agenda here in Nevada, a large portion of each meeting agenda is built around dealing with performance-enhancing drugs.”

The difficulty is in finding a way for the UFC to run its own supplemental program, but without the appearance of a conflict of interest that might come with too much UFC oversight.

That’s why it needs to not only pay an outside agency to do the testing, experts say, but also come up with a clear protocol and a transparent process that applies to all fighters equally. It must balance the need to use its authority over fighters to make them adhere to the program and to hold them accountable with standards beyond what state athletic commissions are willing to adopt, yet without also using that authority to influence the appeal or punishment process.

And, make no mistake, that’s not always an easy line to walk.

“Really, that’s what’s best for the sport, because it keeps them from having to police their own athletes, which no one likes to do,” Tygart said. “You’re there to promote those athletes, not to punish them.”

Still, both Goodman and Tygart said, no matter what the UFC announces on Wednesday, it has to do something. Continuing to let the commissions handle it doesn’t seem to be working, and the sport’s PED problem isn’t likely to get better all on its own.

Catching cheaters is one thing. But, according to Goodman, a few positive tests don’t prove that the current system is working.

“What it proves,” she said, “is that there’s a huge performance-enhancing drug problem in mixed martial arts.”