The ugly situation with Chael Sonnen seemingly reached a conclusion on Wednesday, as Sonnen retired from active MMA competition on UFC Tonight. This week has been a disaster for Sonnen, who failed a random drug test on Tuesday and showed the hypocrisy of himself and his employer, Fox Sports 1. But more than anything else, I think what this week showed all of us is that when networks employ active athletes as commentators, things can quickly spiral out of control.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=04sZmsXFndM

Let’s use Sonnen as an example, since he’s the reason this post is being written. He’s fought twice in the nearly ten months since Fox Sports 1 launched, and one of those fights was the main event of the first UFC show on the network. Since then, he fought in November and lost in the first round to Rashad Evans… and that’s it. Yet, the UFC Tonight platform gave Sonnen a much broader audience than most fighters, and while he wasn’t a top-tier fighter at any stretch last year, you wouldn’t know that from hearing him talk on national television. Sonnen was placed on the national stage through his UFC Tonight hosting gig, and if you knew nothing about MMA, you’d think he was a much higher ranked and decorated fighter than he really is.

We talked about this a few months ago when both NFL Network and ESPN brought in current NFL free agents to work as analysts on their studio shows – Nate Burleson and Ryan Clark. If you’re a free agent competing with Burleson or Clark for a job, how would you feel about each of those players getting what essentially was a free ad for their services on national TV? By the same token, if you’re a UFC fighter angling for a title shot or a big fight, is it really fair that Sonnen can talk his way into a higher profile position simply because he’s on Fox Sports 1?

Bringing in current athletes as guest analysts during the Postseason is nothing new. We’ve seen it time and time again with virtually every network, including Fox, CBS, ESPN, MLB Network, NFL Network, etc. However, there’s a difference between bringing in a player for a week or two and trotting out a current player every week as a co-host of a studio show. Imagine if Kevin Millar was hosting Intentional Talk… while he was floundering about in his last year in the majors with the Blue Jays. Imagine if Donovan McNabb showed up every week on the Fox Sports Live panel… while struggling with the Vikings in 2011. Imagine if Ray Lewis didn’t wait to join ESPN’s NFL coverage until after he retired. How would each network and player handle any kind of controversy that came up during those active playing days? It would be a mess.

Yet, Sonnen was allowed to serve as both a fighter and a studio analyst for the last ten months. And I’m not disparaging Sonnen’s work as an analyst for Fox – I think he’s awesome at it, and retiring after defeating Shogun Rua in the main event of the first ever live UFC show on Fox Sports 1 in August would have been the perfect transition into becoming an analyst full-time. Instead, Sonnen toed the line and tried to pull off both roles. It blew up in everyone’s faces this week, but let’s be honest – we could see this end coming. Did anyone really believe that Sonnen, who had failed a drug test in the past and received a therapeutic use exemption for TRT (testosterone replacement therapy) use, would survive unscathed after TRT was banned in Nevada?

At the end of the day, the details behind Sonnen’s failed test are inconsequential. He tested positive for banned substances, and that’s that. The question now is what happens to his television career.

Given Sonnen’s hypocrisy and the platform given to him by FS1, there’s now a severe lack of trust with viewers. How much did this fiasco hurt his credibility going forward as a television analyst? Is he going to make excuses for fighters who test positive, or hypocritically bash them? This situation has created a giant mess for everyone involved, and I really don’t think there is a quick or easy fix. It’s just what Fox Sports 1 was asking for in giving such a bright spotlight to Chael Sonnen.

About Joe Lucia

I hate your favorite team. I also sort of hate most of my favorite teams.