Don't shoot the pro wrestling messenger Lance Storm, MMA fans!

Former ECW, WCW and WWE wrestler Lance Storm has ruffled the feathers of a few MMA fans with his latest website commentary entitled Tapping Out explaining his recent decision to quit being a fan of UFC and MMA in general.  Storm, who may be the only professional wrestler who has been more vociferously anti-drugs throughout his career than the straight edge CM Punk, is upset at Dana White for booking lying drugs cheat Chael Sonnen in the ultra lax state of Texas and at the Pennsylvania Athletic Commission for somehow screwing up their Nate Marquardt hearing by making the bizarre decision to lift his suspension, despite Marquardt not being able to pass a drug test on time to compete at UFC on Versus 4.  I think Storm's most valuable comments were those about TRT, which was once exploited as a loophole in WWE's Wellness policy by several wrestlers to enhance their physiques by super dosing and getting away with it because they had a quack doctor's note, until the Chris Benoit double murder suicide scandal and the ensuing WWE Congressional investigation put paid to that:

To make matters worse Nate's problem stems from testosterone replacement therapy, the same bullshit excuse Chael Sonnen used for his steroid use.  This whole issue makes me even madder because, in my not completely uneducated opinion, the Testosterone Replacement Therapy deal is a complete load of horse shit.  None of these fighters are suffering from low levels of testosterone unless they are self induced by previous steroid use.  We are talking about incredible fit, very muscular individuals, some of which appear on the cover of Muscle, and Fitness magazines, they are not suffering from low levels of testosterone, unless they are taking steroids for an extended period of time and then get off to produce the desired effect when they go to their doctors for a prescription.

Even if they were on legitimate replacement therapy their testosterone levels should never be so far out of whack as to produce a positive test.  Are we to believe that Nate's testosterone levels were so far below the lower end of the normal range that he was unable to function and thus needed medical assistance?  He then got on replacement therapy to try to get himself back up into the normal range and that dose for some reason put him so far above the high end of the normal range as to product a failed steroid test.  Give me a freakin break!  What is the point of even having a commission if they are going to bend over backwards to allow fighters to circumvent testing and avoid suspension, with bullshit excuses like this?

Instead of shooting the pro wrestling messenger for hypocrisy, which in Storm's case is unfair as his position on steroids has been consistent throughout his career, MMA fans should be embarrassed and ashamed that drug testing is less stringent (at least on paper) in their beloved sport than that of the industry leader in the fake sport of professional wrestling, WWE.  Not only are WWE wrestlers drug tested more frequently than MMA fighters, but they're also tested at random unannounced times, making cheating the tests much more difficult.  Moreover, WWE are no longer giving out new therapeutic use exemptions for testosterone, after they realised how easy it was for their performers to abuse such a system.  At least the punishment for a failed drug test is stiffer in MMA, but that clearly hasn't been a deterrent so far, especially when fighters still often get their suspensions cut just by putting up any old defence.  That isn't to say that WWE is clean, far from it, just that they (apparently) do a better job of policing performance enhancing drug use than UFC or the athletic commissions currently do for MMA.  Indeed, there is still no effective drug test for human growth hormone and it is believed that many of the WWE main event performers who can afford to buy that drug use it to enhance their physiques, which is probably a trick used by many MMA fighters too for performance enhancing purposes.  But at least WWE's Wellness policy seems to be effective at stopping their wrestlers from using easily detectable drugs, which isn't the case in MMA at the moment.