Steve Johnson says the Jannik Sinner doping ban ruling "smells fishy" to him as the former American tennis star has some questions.
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After the WADA lodged an appeal in the ITIA's verdict and said that they would seek a 1-2 year ban for the 23-year-old, the world No. 1 was due to appear in a CAS court between April 16-17.
But then, the two parties struck a deal and Sinner accepted a three-month doping ban.
One of the first things that stuck out in their settlement was the fact that it would end on May 4th - three days before the start of the Rome Masters and three weeks before the French Open.
While the three-time Grand Slam winner will miss four Masters tournaments during his doping suspension, he will still get to play his home Masters and won't miss any Majors.
Johnson: All of it smells fishy to me...
I think it just all of it smells fishy to me. I don't want to get into innocent, guilty, whatever he did," the former four-time ATP champion said on the Nothing Major Podcast.
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"It seems a bit suspicious that he gets suspended arbitrarily for three months and he doesn't miss any tournaments. He comes back the day before, two days before Rome gets to go. So he gets to play his home Masters series. He doesn't miss any slams.
"He gets to play the French Open. He gets to play Wimbledon. And that part, just I don't like, just something doesn't smell right to me about that. But that's just my opinion.
Since the news came out, there has been a lot of talk about Sinner getting "a favorable deal" - even to the point where a WADA official had to publicly address it and state that there was "no favoritism" from their side.
