Abner Mares supports Nonito Donaire's crusade, would gladly do extra drug testing

Abner Mares says that if given an opportunity to fight Nonito Donaire, he would happily take any additional drug testing required or asked of him, and respects the Filipino fighter's VADA crusade:

"I give props to Nonito for doing it, showing the world that he's clean; that he doesn't need all of that to win," Mares declared. "I'm with it, I'm with it. If we were to fight, I'll be behind him 100% to do this. My hat off to him. We got to keep it like that for the sport. ... It's a fight I've been looking forward to. It's a fight I want for my career and also for the fans. It's a fight fans have been asking for by fans for quite some time now. I think it's time."

Mares (25-0-1, 13 KO) desperately wants a fight with Donaire (31-1, 20 KO), and both fighters have said they've tried pushing their feuding promoters at Golden Boy and Top Rank to make the fight. It seems no closer to actually happening, though. Bob Arum spoke about the fight recently, and said that it will only happen if it's HBO, and Top Rank promotes the fight with Mares essentially being bought out by the company for one fight. Mares has risen up the ranks exclusively on Showtime.

One thing worth wondering is, if Mares is so supportive of Donaire's cause, why doesn't he join Donaire in doing 24/7/365 testing with VADA? Why wait until a specific fight? If "we got to keep it like that for the sport," then why not back Donaire's play and join the anti-PEDs war, whether or not there's a fight with Donaire in the future? It's not like Mares has to fight Donaire for VADA to do random testing on him, too.

Mares last fought on November 10, beating Anselmo Moreno on Showtime. Donaire closed his 4-0 year with a three-round blowout of Jorge Arce on HBO on December 15.