It’s that time of the week, y’all! You’ve got questions, I’ve got answers. So let’s chat about UFC 324, MMA referees, and UFC double champs.
Of all the double-champs, who are worthy of the Conor McGregor trophy for the least impressive defense runs? (The Mac being hors concours for not having defended any of his titles)
Because you didn’t clarify, I’m going to assume we’re talking about all two-division champions, and not just “champ-champs,” since there are 11 double champs, and only five champ-champs. And the harsh reality is, basically, none of them are good.
Seriously, look at the double champ history of the UFC: every one of them has big, glaring caveats attached.
Randy Couture and B.J. Penn did it when the sport was still developing; Georges St-Pierre, Jon Jones, and Henry Cejudo were blatant opportunists who moved up to win a belt they thought they could take, and then bailed after making no defenses or completely garbage defenses. Daniel Cormier has a big, huge asterisk on his light heavyweight title, and Alex Pereira’s middleweight belt isn’t much better. And Amanda Nunes’s two titles were functionally just one belt, because women’s featherweight is a real division in name only.
Then, of course, there’s Islam Makhachev and Ilia Topuria, who only joined this club last year and have yet to make title defenses. Frankly, Ilia seems poised to join Jones, GSP, and Cejudo in the “I don’t care about this really, I’m just grabbing a belt” club, because he bailed on featherweight prematurely, and is already trying to do the same to lightweight. And Makhachev is openly campaigning for something similar as he tries to fight Kamaru freaking Usman.
The reason I put so much stock in title defenses, and substantially less stock in double champ status, is that the history of the sport tells us one is far more impressive than the other.
Anyway, if I have to pick the least impressive of all of these (excluding Topuria and Makhachev, who we will at least give the benefit of the doubt to about the future), it has to be Georges St-Pierre. The man was essentially retired, saw Michael Bisping randomly win the belt, and realized the opportunity that he had before him. He came back for one fight, lied the whole time that he was staying, beat Bisping, and immediately bailed. One of the most shambolic title fights in MMA history.
Justin Gaethje vs. Paddy Pimblett
There’s a lot to take in here, and, obviously, most of these are not MMA related, so I’m going to answer the two MMA questions first, and then quickly respond to the non-MMA questions before moving on.
I’ve gone back and forth on the UFC 324 main event since it was announced (which is a sign that this is a good fight). On the one hand, Gaethje is definitely past his prime, and even at his best, he was never a good defensive grappler, whereas Pimblett is at the peak of his powers and is a very good offensive grappler.
On the other hand, Pimblett has basically never beaten anybody who was good (at the time he beat them), and he leaves his head way up there in the air to get checked, and Gaethje is probably the hardest hitter at 155 pounds.
This is an old-school striker vs. grappler matchup, and that’s what makes it so intriguing.
I have a full technical breakdown of this fight coming, and I still don’t know who I favor in the matchup, but the answer is probably Pimblett. He’s proven to be a better fighter than most people thought he’d become, and he’s peaking, while Gaethje is nearly out the door. That’s a bad setup for Gaethje.
But I don’t really care about what my head says right now. Gaethje is one of my favorite fighters to ever compete, because he’s the most exciting MMA fighter of all-time. And when he says he is going to retire if he loses, well, I kind of believe him. And I’m not ready for that to happen. Yes, at some point we will have to come to terms with Gaethje leaving his violence crown behind, but I’m not there yet, so I’m picking Gaethje to win. Let’s keep this train rolling for a few more stops at least.
As for the alternate ending (this is in reference to a genie letting me undo one MMA outcome, which would be Conor McGregor’s 13-second KO of Jose Aldo): 100 percent. In a heartbeat. Not only would we undo one of the most tragic outcomes in the history of this sport (a generation of fans were made dumber by McGregor’s greatest accomplishment), but I’d also get peak Conor vs. peak Gaethje? Sign me the eff up. McGregor vs. Gaethje is a fight I wanted for years, and now, it’s past its expiration date. But the two of them going at each other in their primes? Pure cinema.
As for the other questions:
2. No, but I will. Game of Thrones was one of the best TV shows ever made until they ran out of books to write from (Benioff and Weiss should be put in the stockade for the ending), and House of the Dragon is decent. And all the books are good, so I suspect I’ll enjoy A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms.
3. Not yet, but never pass on Damon and Affleck being sickos together. I’m sure it’s fun, even if it might not be “good.”
5. I’ve played many of the Pinehurst courses, though not No. 2, but I’m sure I will in the near future. Pebble first, Payne’s second, #2 third.
With consistent issues regarding reffing in the UFC I’d be interested in your opinion on referee involvement. Eastern orgs and sports the ref is far less lenient, gets way more involved but also pushes the fighters to go for it, do you think UFC could benefit from that?
Couple of examples from other orgs over time:
Green/red/yellow cards for infractions, being point/monetary repercussions to DQ.
Refs calling to the judges to let them know when a submission is locked in rather than just a threat, so they can score more accurately
Refs penalising fighters for inactivity and timidity
Refs seeing a fighter get hit on the back of the head and placing their hand on the back of that fighters head to stop further contact, while the fights still going, snatching their hands off the cage etc. So an actual physical intervention instead of just a warning
Just a few examples of how reffing in other orgs/rulesets do things different. Do you think any of this might be good to bring over to western audiences, would it improve the quality of fights?
First, I want to be clear — there’s a big difference between the issues we have with referees and much of what you put out here. I don’t have issues with the current crop of UFC refs because they do or don’t do the above items; I have issues because they do not enforce the rules on the books and because there is zero accountability for bad refs.
That being said, I firmly believe the sport would improve with more referee involvement — in specific and limited capacities — so long as you could ensure Herb Dean and company would do it. Because MMA would be much better right now if the UFC refs actually took points and enforced fouls as they are supposed to do, but opt not to for nebulous reasons of “fairness” that wouldn’t pass scrutiny from a fifth grader.
But let me address each proposed shift, one by one:
Cards — I hate the idea of monetary penalties, but support points being taken for certain fouls, and I do think that deducting points via cards is a small thing, but would actually make things more clear for viewers.
Refs Talking to Judges — Eh, pass on this one. The bigger issue with judging is that sitting cageside is among the worst seats in the house. Judges should be in a room watching the silent broadcast for major MMA.
Timidity Penalties — This is a rule on the books now, and no ref ever does it. That is silly. Referees should absolutely enforce timidity rules. This is a spectator sport, and we should encourage action.
Physical Intervention — I mean, again, this is something they should do, but refs mostly just let fighters cheat, I assume, because they don’t think it’s a good rule and so choose not to seriously enforce it. But yes, if a penalty occurs, there should be intervention and a restart, not a continuation.
Broadly speaking, I think all of those would be fine to see more of. But let me give you the keys to the kingdom here. I have solved the MMA penalty system. I’ve had it solved for a long time and been pushing this idea for years it feels like. It’s simple, logical, and could go into effect tomorrow, and would immediately improve the sport dramatically.
In a perfect system, “minor infractions” would receive a “Yellow card” and then positional advantage for the non-offending fighter. So, you land a glancing low blow, the ref stops the bout, issues a warning, and after your opponent recovers, the opponent chooses the restart position — standing or top half guard, or bottom guard if they want. Same for grabbing the fence, or grazing eye pokes. Yellow doesn’t have a point deduction or a fine, just a positional change and a warning. Multiple Yellows (i.e. two) equals a “Red” and a point deduction. Once you have one Red, next foul is another Red. Three Reds, DQ.
And if the foul is egregious, meaning it substantively affected the non-offending party to a degree that a positional change is not likely to even things up — think a very serious eye poke, straight to the point deduction.
This is very simple and obvious, and the fact that it doesn’t exist is insane.
Thanks for reading, and thank you to everyone who sent in questions. Do you have any burning questions about things at least somewhat related to combat sports? Then you’re in luck, because you can send them to me. Every Sunday (sometimes I forget and it happens on Monday), I’ll put out a call for questions on The Feed. Doesn’t matter if they’re topical or insane; just drop y
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