Claudia Gadelha is currently in charge of UFC BJJ and although she’s attempting to bring the best grapplers in the world in to the promotion, she’s not looking to sign Gordon Ryan. That might seem strange seeing as Ryan is both the most successful no gi competitor in the world right now and one of the most popular figures, but Gadelha has her reasons. It actually stems from something completely unrelated to Ryan’s performance on the mats, and is more to do with what he does behind closed doors. Ryan has been outspoken about his use of PEDs since at least 2017 and that’s something that apparently doesn’t mix with Gadelha’s vision for the promotion.
Mikey Musumeci already revealed that UFC BJJ was going to introduce testing for PEDs, and Gadelha actually confirmed it in a recent interview. It was when she spoke about the topic that she brought up Ryan:
“Yes, (testing) will come in because we want to professionalize the sport. So, it’s the best in the world against the best, right? The best in the world against the best in the clean world. It’s not the most doped, no. No longer doped. And Gordon (Ryan) will never compete in UFC BJJ. If you’re doped, you won’t compete. So without dope, there is no Gordon.”
The really interesting part of this statement is that Ryan has actually competed for the precursor to UFC BJJ, UFC Fight Pass Invitational, in the past. This shows that the promotion’s goals for the sport must have shifted pretty dramatically over the past few years. What doesn’t make sense is the leaked news that the promotion was reportedly originally looking to book Ryan opposite Musumeci in their first reality show season. Either that wasn’t correct at the time, UFC BJJ only took this stance very recently, or Gadela isn’t being completely transparent. The truth might never be known, but she was very clear that Ryan isn’t welcome to compete at UFC BJJ right now at least:
“I say this because he says so himself; he refuses to not use because he thinks it is part of an athlete’s package. It’s his philosophy. He is very transparent about this… If he is (on PEDs) he does not compete.”
The full interview with Claudia Gadelha where she explains why Gordon Ryan won’t be competing at UFC BJJ was uploaded to the official YouTube channel of Connect Cast Podcast:
