Comments on: MMA Gospel - After Couture vs. Vera UD at UFC 105, It's Clear MMA Judging is Arbitrary

By: Reverend Turk of MMA Gospel Radio

Reverend Turk of MMA Gospel Radio — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 11:52:51 +0000

I don’t think I ever mentioned it being an issue with organizations. It is clearly an athletic commision issue and must be dealt with before we see the sport go the way of boxing

By: Dustin

Dustin — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 21:28:52 +0000

Wouldn’t this be a issue with the Athletic commison and not so much the UFC. The UFC is just a promotion like Pride, Strikeforce, WEC ETC… Complain to the Athletic Commission. Doesn’t have anything to do with Promotions they don’t control Judges or Referees…

By: Reverend Turk of MMA Gospel Radio

Reverend Turk of MMA Gospel Radio — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 12:02:18 +0000

Amen Dean!! I believe we need to grade the judges in the sport. We need to set up criteria and when the judges fall below 80% they need to be suspended and must then take a course(s) and then take a test to be reinstated.

Also, Anyoen else wonder why we always see the same 5 refs in mma here in the US?

Isn’t it time we got a larger group of refs to rotate in and out? No one can tell me those five guys are the only ones that are willing or up to the task of reffing in events like UFC, Strikeforce and WEC

By: Dean of lean

Dean of lean — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 04:36:45 +0000

The Shogun/Machida and Couture / Vera fights show the problems with having Boxing coaches ref a sport with large elements of grappling and Jiu JItsu.

SUbmission attempts and attempts to finish the fight are not scored high enuff where as stalling or holding a top position is over scored. Top positions are worthless if there is no striking or submission attempts from there.

Some guys are more dangerous off their backs!!

Having leaned into a guy for 3 rounds is not an attempt at finishing the fight IMO.

By: Reverend Turk of MMA Gospel Radio

Reverend Turk of MMA Gospel Radio — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 17:44:12 +0000

@Enzo

Who is bragging? What is there to brag about? I also did not compare anything to the Shogun fight. I simply brought that fight into the discussion as well.

According to the NSAC rules and guidelines for judging, Machida did not win that fight.

As for your idea of sending a letter to the commission, that is a failure at best. Sending one to the NSAC does nothing to change how Ohio, California, etc. score fights.

By: Enzo

Enzo — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 22:48:12 +0000

I knew it that whenever a controversial decision would come up some “smart” guy will compare it to the Machida-Shogun decision.
Guess what: Machida WON the fight clearly by the rules. NO question about it. Don’t like the UFC rules? I don’t like them too. I prefer PRIDE rules where the judges score the entire fight as a whole instead of scoring separate rounds.
Send a letter to the Athletic Commission, don’t brag about it on the Internet.

By: Reverend Turk of MMA Gospel Radio

Reverend Turk of MMA Gospel Radio — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 11:28:02 +0000

Zach,

Please remember that people do the judging and therefore will always see things differently. We will always have close decisions and it falls on us to scream loud enough to make sure the judges are scoring the fight based on the proper criteria.

By: Zach

Zach — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 00:50:53 +0000

I agree totally with this article. It is really devastating for a fighter to train really hard and put their heart out on the line in the fight and lose to a poor decision by the judges knowing they won. I believe that something has to be done because it is taking away from the sport and i really hope they can fix this problem and the judges can start making correct decisions.

By: Reverend Turk Vangel

Reverend Turk Vangel — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 23:58:50 +0000

@dustin Why yes it is. I go in to detail that shows the flaw, how it has undermined fights and give a brief description of how to start to fix it. It also shows that per NSAC regulations for judging , there is no way Randy could have been awarded a victory over Vera unless the judges showed obvious bias, were unclear as to what they were supposed to be scoring on and/or are not mma judges but rather boxing judges used for a mma fight.

By: dustin

dustin — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 22:44:13 +0000

This blog is simply pointing out that there is a flaw in the judging system that needs fixing!

By: Reverend Turk of MMA Gospel Radio

Reverend Turk of MMA Gospel Radio — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 19:21:30 +0000

@Blass Not true at all. Vera ad a knock down in round two which is both effective and aggressive. In round three he had a takedown and mount. This gives him two rounds.

By: db

db — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 18:25:24 +0000

Who cares, it was a boring fight any neither opponent did anything “effective”. Vera has yet to do anything of substance in the octagon and unfortunately for all fight fans Couture’s time is done.

By: Blass

Blass — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 17:27:47 +0000

the author fails to look at the criteria by round. that is what decided the fight. even in the last round when vera got the takedown randy still dominated him…only the first round may have went to vera…maybe…i too have been sorely disappointed in the scoring of some fights. it boils down to the fact that since decisions are indeed arbitrary, the fighter has to take it out of the judges hands… its a system and it does work. when dana white gets more and more like don king is when we have to really worry about mma going the way of boxing.

By: Eric

Eric — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 17:13:24 +0000

The UFC should be embarrassed by their judges. Between the Rua and Vera decisions, judging has become a joke.

By: bruce padgett

bruce padgett — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 16:51:33 +0000

i am a big fan of cotoure. he has done it all in the mma world. hope he gets two more shots at titles. one more at lt heavy and one more at heavy. shogun got robbed when he fought machida. rua won every round in my opinion. its a shame that scoring is corrupt just like in in boxing. example the wbc= we be collecting

By: Dustin

Dustin — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 16:51:20 +0000

Very good article. I agree 100%. Hold these judges accountable, in the end these are men and women fighters careers on the line.