BIG MOMENTS IN SCORING HISTORY

By Ben Miller

Quick, what were the big moments in the Velazquez vs. Rothwell fight? The takedowns, right? That was an easy one because it was so one-sided.

What about Carano vs. Cyborg? That one had some back and forth action. I’d say a big moment was when Carano had Cyborg on the ground. The future B-movie action star hit several nice punches but then she stood up because she was afraid of being submitted. It gave Cyborg a reprieve and Carano never held a decisive edge after that.

Let’s think about other sports. If you watch college football or baseball or soccer, what are the big moments in recent matches? Each one probably has at least one that comes to mind.

Now let’s look at Machida vs. Shogun. Try to guess the biggest moment in that fight.

Got one?

I bet it’s wrong. I’m betting that your guess is wrong because even the man who felt he got robbed didn’t remember it.

The biggest moment in Shogun vs. Machida occurred near the end of the third round.

The prelude was when Machida, somehow up by two rounds already on two of the three judges’ scorecards, leaped out of his defensive shell and came in for a series of strikes. He hit Shogun with a nice punch but then Shogun hit a wild right that staggered Machida, causing the champion to clinch.

Then it happened. With the two men clinching and Machida wobbly from the punch, Shogun went for his signature trip takedown. He had it. But the cage was there. Shogun pushed forward but Machida’s back hit the cage, giving Lyoto just enough leverage to stay on off his back.

At this point, a skeptic might ask why that is such a big moment. It was one missed takedown. There were two rounds left. The momentum really didn’t shift. How could that possibly be such a big deal?

The answer lies in the judging. The non-sensical, round-by-round scoring system that has become MMA’s skin rash. The answer is that Shogun’s little missed takedown was a big deal because if he’d have gotten it the judges almost certainly would have given him round 3, thus preventing him from being in an insurmountable 30-27 hole on two of the three judges’ scorecards.

In a just MMA world, that takedown wouldn’t matter. Or at least not matter much. The round would have expired shortly thereafter with both men largely unaffected, and they would have gone on to decide a winner in rounds 4 and 5. That’s how it works when MMA fights are scored as a whole rather than round-by-round. The judges consider the impact of a takedown and weigh it against everything else that happened in the fight.

In round-by-round scoring, judges must search for events to justify their scoring. They must seek out every punch, kick, takedown and submission attempt in order to come up with a score. So if a round has little action but a takedown is secured, that lone takedown might be worth the whole point given in the round. Another round in the fight might have multiple takedowns, strikes or submission attempts. Each one individually will hardly matter because it’s the sum total of all action that will likely result in that same singular point being won for that round.

I understand the logic behind round-by-round scoring. On the surface, it provides accountability. Incompetent and potentially corrupt judges must show how they scored fights, which theoretically allows athletic commissions to weed them out more easily. In reality, it’s a cynical bargain that was made years ago when MMA was struggling for acceptance. The thinking was that any move to make MMA more like boxing might help legitimize the sport, and round-by-round scoring was part and parcel to that.

All of this is not to say that full fight scoring is immune to bad judging. Anyone who’s followed Japanese MMA for any length of time can attest to that. I just think that full fight scoring helps. It results in fewer bad decisions, it gives fighters who score early incentive to stay busy and it might allow commission judges who cut their teeth on boxing to get away from that points-based mindset.

When I think of MMA judging, I like to recall a conversation I had with Todd Martin on one of our many drives to MMA shows. The topic was boxing and MMA. Specifically, we were talking about the pros and cons of each. Todd mentioned that one of the things he likes best about MMA is that it feels like a real fight. The point of an MMA fight still seems to be to try to beat the other man. In boxing, he surmised, it’s become such a tactical sport that the point has become landing enough punches to score points rather than knocking out your foe.

MMA is a long way from crumbling into a sport that is no longer about beating an opponent in a fight, but round-by-round judging sure isn’t helping. That said, I hope that MMA promotions and athletic commissions realize that it’s a different sport than boxing and that round-by-round scoring just doesn’t fit. Without a change away from that type of scoring, we’ll surely see more fights where the big moments aren’t what they should be.

*********************