By: Frank Hyden, MMATorch Senior Columnist
As a new year begins it’s time to break out my irregular tradition of
making some MMA New Year’s Resolutions. Most of these are what I would love for MMA organizations to resolve to do.
Create a MMA Council
I would love to see an MMA organization create a few MMA Councils. One would be retired fighters. This would be the one that I would want as
many people in as possible.
I would also want a Council of referees and one for judges would be very important also.
And one for trainers and I would also want one for MMA fans as well as
one for nutritionists and doctors.
Depending on the council, topics that would be discussed would include things such as fighter pay, training methods, fight rules, television production, safety (weight-cutting rules and such), and so on.
These Councils would serve in an advisory capacity and be a way to
spread and increase knowledge.
Take a point, Ref. Part One
I hate eyepokes. They’re dangerous and can end a fighter’s career in
an instant. Most of them are avoidable. Some aren’t, there’s no
question. You can’t remove the eyepoke completely but you can stop a lot of them.
There’s technical aspects you can get into involving different ways to
make gloves and all that, I’m not going to get into all that. I’m not a glove designer so I wouldn’t know what I was talking about.
Certainly not to the degree that I could talk about this as if I were an expert. This isn’t ESPN or Fox Sports or the litany of other sports-related channels, websites, etc.
What I do know about, because it’s common sense, is that if you’re standing there with your fingers pointed straight out at your opponent’s eyes, you have a higher chance of poking them in the eye.
That’s complete BS and needs to be treated as such.
Now what can an MMA organization do about this?
A lot.
The first eyepoke of a fight is an automatic 1-point deduction,
subject to video review that could elevate the deduction to two or
more points if you’re found to have been sticking your fingers
straight at an opponent’s eyes.
Sticking your fingers straight out at an opponent, even without making any contact at all, is a warning for the first time then an automatic
1-point deduction. A third time equals two points and so on. Even if
none of these times come close to an opponent you’re still deducted points.
There’s no valid reason to stick your fingers straight out at an opponent.
I’m also in favor of fines and suspensions but the fighters already
make so little compared to most sports that I’m a little hesitant to be overly punitive.
However, it’s past time to legislate out the eyepoke.
Take a point, Ref. Part Two
Another change I would make concerns low blows. It’s much harder to
discern intent with low blows compared to eyepokes because inside leg
kicks to the thigh can easily stray north if you’re not careful or if
your opponent moves.
Therefore, I wouldn’t be as adamant about some aspects of dealing with low blows.
However, I do believe that your second low blow of a fight should be
an automatic 1-point deduction and I would lean toward saying that if
the recipient can’t continue they’re given a TKO victory over the low blow dealer, who is given a TKO loss. I realize that this could lead to some fighters trying to get out of a losing fight this way, though,
so I’m not sure if I would make that a rule. This is an instance where I would lean heavily on the MMA Fighter Council for guidance.
A third low blow during a fight is an automatic loss, though. Reaching that point is too much to sustain.
Mandatory training for judges with clear criteria
This one isn’t as cut and dry as it should be because it heavily
involves outside forces but maybe an MMA organization should have its
own panel of judges for every fight and event and if the scores of the official judges differs greatly from the companies’ own judges, you can at least make monetary adjustments (a fighter who gets robbed on
the scorecards gets their win bonus anyway).
That wouldn’t fix anything, of course, but it would at least help
soften the blow for the lower level fighters on those low contracts.
Something you could fix, at least somewhat, though it does still
involve others, is making the criteria clear on what wins fights.
We’ve all seen fights where a fighter gets a takedown but their
opponent gets right back up. Some judges seem to judge that more favorably than others. What’s the true worth of that? You’re wearing
down your opponent somewhat but how effective is that? How should it be judged?
This is an area where I would lean heavily on the guidance of an MMA Fighter Council as well as an MMA Judges Council. I would also want the trainers to weigh in also.
We see too many 30-27 Fighter A from one judge and 29-28 from another
judge moments to just let this pass. I know some fights and rounds are
very close but we’ve all seen enough bad decisions (or ones we
disagreed with) that criteria needs to be set and mentioned.
We could all probably come up with some more but I’ll leave it for now, as I feel these are the most pressing and urgently needed. If you
have any MMA Resolutions of your own let me know. I hope everyone has a great 2025.
My new epic fantasy book is out. It’s called Kingdom of Zarias: The End’s Beginning. The exciting epic fantasy series Kingdom of Zarias returns with the 4th book in the series. After the harrowing events of
Book 3 the residents of the Kingdom of Zarias continue on their paths.
Serena Summers continues to learn and grow as a fighter, desperately
seeking to become stronger before she loses anyone else in her life.
Daniel Summers discovers new parts of the world that open his eyes to just how little he truly knows. A new hero, Lamar Abeers, arrives to
join the fight against evil. Plus, Zach Summers, Tiana Highsmith, and Xavien Ekens continue their journeys with their friends, and a new
ruler of Vhaharen is crowned. The world has found a little peace.
However, that peace is only temporary. In a shocking act of violence,
the monstrous villain Galren strikes from the shadows and changes the
world forever. This is Book 4 in the series. There’s lots of action,
magic, and monsters in the Kingdom of Zarias. It’s like a tabletop
game in novel form. It’s on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and many other places. If you’re interested, I would greatly appreciate it if you would check it out and support me. Also, here’s the link to my Compendium book about the Kingdom of Zarias series- KoZ Compendium Thank you
very much, have a good day.
Comments and suggestions can be emailed to me at
hydenfrank@gmail.com and you can follow me on X at @hydenfrank. Thanks
for reading and have a good day.
Leave a Reply