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Dana White said this afternoon that Daniel Cormier will be fighting at UFC 200, and in speaking off the cuff, seemed to intimate Jon Jones may be in even more trouble than previously thought.

“There are tons of guys that are interested. We’ll get a fight done,” White said to Colin Cowherd on FS 1 today.

Later, White said Cormier would fight this weekend, would get the same money* as he would have against Jones, and that they hope to have the fight finalized and announced by the end of the day today.

*Cormier’s money is based on a percentage, but the amount is expected to be lower since the number of buys will likely be lower.

Cormier had said he was willing to fight anyone up to 220 pounds, saying that because he’s dropped so much weight he wasn’t willing to fight a big heavyweight.

White nixed the talk of Michael Bisping, which would be the most marketable potential fight for storyline reasons.

“Bisping just won the 185 pound title,” he said.  “Let me tell you what Bisping does in his off season.  When Bisping’s not training, he goes on a bender. He’s in no condition to fight Daniel Cormier. I promise you that. I don’t even have to ask him.”

Bisping was the third name after Gegard Mousasi and Tom Lawlor who publicly asked for the fight when word got out that Jones was off. He would make the most sense given it would create an historical champion vs. champion fight, and there is a storyline situation with Bisping having just beaten Luke Rockhold on June 4 to win the middleweight title.

Even if odds would be against it, it would make for a remarkable story if Bisping could win two titles on short notice.  In fact, if such a thing would happen, it would probably go down as something that would be a huge part of the history of the sport that would be talked about for decades as the perhaps the most remarkable feat in UFC history.

Mousasi was already scheduled to fight Thiago Santos on Saturday. For fighters who have trained and are in top condition, Mousasi is really the only choice, but there is no story built around that fight. Mousasi was to fight at middleweight, but has fought at heavyweight in the past and fought for years at light heavyweight.

Glover Teixeira said today it would be impossible for him to make weight to fight Cormier, but Alexander Gustafsson said he could make it and do the fight. In the case of the former, Teixeira is set to face Anthony Johnson later this summer in essentially a #1 contender’s fight while Gustafsson and Cormier had a Fight of the Year candidate in 2015.

Onto the Jones story, White confirmed that Jones did not test positive for a recreational drug.

Also, when saying how it’s virtually impossible the B sample will come back clean, White mentioned two different agents in the A sample test failure. It is possible testing positive for two agents could lead to a suspension longer than two years.

Jones held a press conference Thursday morning where he denied taking any performance enhancing drugs.

Additional notes by Dave Meltzer

A visibly distraught Jon Jones denied knowingly taking performance-enhancing drugs at a press conference Thursday morning after being flagged by USADA for a potential out of competition drug test failure on Wednesday night.

The emotional Jones had to leave the press conference to gather himself briefly before coming back. He apologized for the fans, the UFC, and Daniel Cormier for being removed from the fight. 

“I want to apologize to Daniel Cormier. I know that this fight means a lot to him. The fight means a lot to me and the fight is not happening. So I just want to apologize to everyone sincerely.”

The interim light heavyweight champion and top pound-for-pound fighter in the world was joined by agent Malki Kawa and said that he had never even heard of the substance that led to him being removed from the main event of UFC 200 against Cormier. Kawa said that it is possible that the failure could’ve come from a tainted supplement.

“I’ve been taking the same supplements for the majority of my career and I’ve been so outspoken about being against any type of performance enhancers,” Jones said. “The whole thing sucks because being labeled someone who would ever cheat just really hurts more than anything else I’ve been through in my whole career.”

Both Yoel Romero and Tim Means were able to prove to the satisfaction of USADA officials that it was a supplement they had taken which caused a positive test. In those situations, the fighters were suspended for six months, rather than the usual two years for a first offense.

If such a thing happens here Jones would be eligible to fight on the New Year’s show, but would miss the Madison Square Garden show that he was expected to be part of, whether he won or lost against Cormier.

Kawa said that Jones’ B sample will be tested tonight in Salt Late City, Utah, but that chances the test would come back negative weren’t good.

The big question coming out of this is why it took until July 6 to get the result from the A sample for a test on June 16, and yet a B sample test could come back immediately. And if that is the case, if the B
sample comes back clean (unlikely but it is possible), what that would mean, because in that theory the fight should still be on.

If Jones is unable to prove that the positive test came from a contaminated supplement, that would mean a two-year suspension from the sport. Jones vowed to continue fighting even if given the lengthy suspension.