By Dan Ambrose: The World Boxing Council president Jose Sulaiman is letting former WBC middleweight champion Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. off fairly lighting by ASKING him to attend rehabilitation to get treatment after his positive test for marijuana earlier this month for his fight with Sergio Martinez on September 15th.

The WBC will also be fining Chavez Jr. $10,000, which is light compared to what he could end up receiving from the Nevada State Athletic Commission when it’s their turn to fine the young Chavez Jr. The kicker here is that the WBC won’t be giving Chavez Jr. any suspension at all, period. That’s mighty nice of Sulaiman and the WBC, isn’t it?

Here’s what Sulaiman had to say on the World Boxing Council website: “We have decided to fine him $10,000 USD. That money will be donated to an institution for children who suffer from cancer. We also are asking Julio to attend a rehabilitation center and want official confirmation that he’s so doing. THE WBC will open its doors once again to him, so he can continue his successful career when he feels he can return. The WBC won’t suspend Julio Cesar for an undefined time, because that is not going to help him.”

The rest of what Suliaman had to say was stuff about how suspending Chavez Jr. wouldn’t be good for him, and how he needs to be supported through all this. I like the part where Suliaman says that they’ll be “asking” Chavez Jr. to attend a rehabilitation program. You have to wonder if Chavez Jr. will even bother attending it if he’s not being told to. In looking at how Chavez Jr. liked staying at home a lot during HBO’s 24/7 series and hold strange hours where he’d be up at night and sleep during the say, it might be a big ask to assume that Chavez Jr. will attend a rehabiltation program voluntarily. I can’t see him doing it, but I hope I’m wrong.

It matters little that the WBC has given Chavez Jr. what is pretty much little more than a slap on the hand for his positive marijuana test result. The Nevada State Athletic Commission will be meeting soon to come up with their own penalty for Chavez Jr. and they’re likely not going to let him get off with no suspension, a small fine or “asking” him to attend rehabilitation. The Commission will probably take a huge chunk, if not all, of Chavez Jr’s $3 million purse for the Sergio Martinez fight to go along with a suspension that might extend beyond 7 months up to 1 year.

That definitely isn’t a slap on the hand. That will be a major punishment for Chavez Jr., but this isn’t the first time that he tested positive for drugs. He tested positive in 2009 when he got popped for diuretics for his fight with Troy Rowland. There was also a DUI conviction for Chavez Jr. earlier this year a week before his fight with Marco Antonio Rubio. Chavez Jr. received a seven month suspension for the diuretics case in 2009, and he’ll likely receive more than this time.