The judging criteria is broken - Aggression needs to be rewarded

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Sheepdog

Protecting America from excessive stool loitering
Dec 1, 2015
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14,237
Judging is subjective and judges are corrupt morons, so we will never 'fix' judging. But judging at the very lest should serve the purpose of rewarding people for fighting how we want them to fight. We should not reward guys for running away.

The MMA judging criteria was changed to basically assert 'damage is king'. They simplified the rules in an effort to get judges to stop being completely subjective in what they score, and to an extent it was a wise move. But they went too far.

The problem is, this system allows for guys to run away, barely hurt their opponent and still win. This should not be the case. You should be allowed to counterstrike and win, but it should be premised on you landing substantially - not just 'barely' - more damage to compensate for the fact that the other fighter took more risks and allowed for an actual fight to take place.

I genuinely blame Floyd Mayweather for this cultural shift. In order to sell Floyd PPVs, an entire generation was turned into retarded hipsters who thought they were smart for paying 70 bucks to watch a 'defensive genius' win socrecards while never hurting his opponent in terrible fights. That has spilled over into MMA.

We should judge fights more like how the 'Just Bleed' guy would judge fights, because it makes for better fights.
 

SongExotic2

ATM 3 CHAMPION OF THE WORLD. #FREECAIN
First 100
Jan 16, 2015
39,772
53,672
You are wrong. I happily shell out on Mayweather fights in the hope I'll see him lose. And I like Floyd. Even tho he can't read. I just want to bear witness to his first loss.
 

TheAwkwardTitan

IQ = 209
Jan 30, 2016
1,912
3,334
The UFC has put a lot of work into legitimizing this as a sport, and not just some backyard brawl. Unified rules are in place and judging criteria is there for a reason. Fighters win based on rounds, and how they score points during said rounds. That's how every fight sport on the planet operates from boxing to wrestling to judo. You win based on how you fought within a given set of rules. Sure it's fine if you think those rules need to be amended, but not for the reasons you're giving. Under no circumstances should we give credence to your bull vs matador argument. Is the bull kicking the shit out of the matador because it's running at him to no avail? No. Aggression will never be the most significant set of criteria for judging a fight. Even in the old set of rules octagon control was only supposed to be used when other metrics were neck and neck. Of course there are times where aggression masks itself as effectiveness in the judges eyes, but it shouldn't.

I mean Yoel lost because he wasn't landing and didn't take enough chances to win the belt. How does your rule change help when he literally lost because of his lack of aggression? Furthermore we shouldn't encourage fighters to compromise themselves for entertainment from a rules perspective. We already encourage it with fan support/fight bonuses, and that's more than enough. Anything more and you're asking for fighters to take unnecessary damage because one bad fight hurt your feelings. Shit happens so mock Yoel for being tentative and move on. Nobody asked for an armchair hit piece on the unified rules. There's bigger issues such as a lack of cohesiveness on the part of judges implementing the criteria.

"We should judge fights more like how the 'Just Bleed' guy would judge fights, because it makes for better fights."

BKFC exists.... later dude.
 

Sheepdog

Protecting America from excessive stool loitering
Dec 1, 2015
8,912
14,237
effective aggression is rewarded currently
'Effective Aggressiveness is only to be assessed if Effective Striking/Grappling is 100% equal for both competitors'.

I quite clearly addressed this. I don't think it should be weighted only if damage is equal.
 

Sheepdog

Protecting America from excessive stool loitering
Dec 1, 2015
8,912
14,237
The UFC has put a lot of work into legitimizing this as a sport, and not just some backyard brawl. Unified rules are in place and judging criteria is there for a reason. Fighters win based on rounds, and how they score points during said rounds. That's how every fight sport on the planet operates from boxing to wrestling to judo. You win based on how you fought within a given set of rules. Sure it's fine if you think those rules need to be amended, but not for the reasons you're giving. Under no circumstances should we give credence to your bull vs matador argument. Is the bull kicking the shit out of the matador because it's running at him to no avail? No. Aggression will never be the most significant set of criteria for judging a fight. Even in the old set of rules octagon control was only supposed to be used when other metrics were neck and neck. Of course there are times where aggression masks itself as effectiveness in the judges eyes, but it shouldn't.

I mean Yoel lost because he wasn't landing and didn't take enough chances to win the belt. How does your rule change help when he literally lost because of his lack of aggression? Furthermore we shouldn't encourage fighters to compromise themselves for entertainment from a rules perspective. We already encourage it with fan support/fight bonuses, and that's more than enough. Anything more and you're asking for fighters to take unnecessary damage because one bad fight hurt your feelings. Shit happens so mock Yoel for being tentative and move on. Nobody asked for an armchair hit piece on the unified rules. There's bigger issues such as a lack of cohesiveness on the part of judges implementing the criteria.

"We should judge fights more like how the 'Just Bleed' guy would judge fights, because it makes for better fights."

BKFC exists.... later dude.
Even if you disagree, this is a far more hysterical response than my relatively benign, mild argument warrants (hint: the 'Just Bleed guy' reference was a joke). What I am calling for is hardly some ridiculous fantasy system - it's basically what we used to have, just better. I agree with the new criteria to a large extent. It should be emphasized that damage is the most important aspect of fighting and it's good that we try to avoid Leonard Garcia and Diego Sanchez pulling out bullshit decisions by 'moving forward' while getting lit the fuck up. But that doesn't mean the wording can't be tweaked a little to reward aggression a little more while still emphasizing that damage is the most important thing.

And LOL at 'hit piece on the unified rules'. What is it, a sacred religious text to you? That's genuinely hilarious.

You're also assuming that this post is about Romero-Adesanya, but it's only very tangentially related in the sense that a counterstriker won a close decision and it reminded me to make a point I have made multiple times in the past. Romero didn't do jack shit either, so I'm obviously not arguing that he had 'effectvie aggression' anyway. I thought he won under the current rules - damage in rounds 1, 2 and 5. So that has nothing to do with this argument.

'Furthermore we shouldn't encourage fighters to compromise themselves for entertainment from a rules perspective'.

It's cage fighting. They are already compromised. You're acting as if a minor wording tweak is suddenly going to mean that these guys are going to be rushing in like spastics. We would only see a minor adaptation in fighting styles.

The flaw in the current rules is that it doesn't allow judges to penalize guys based on something that the actual rules prohibit - timidity. In an extreme case, judges would be forced to potentially reward behavior that should have resulted in a disqualification. Judging should be seen as a necessary evil - something we use because time constraints and attention spans prevent a product where a win is necessarily a finish. Therefore judging criteria should more heavily reward guys for trying to get that proper win, because that's what the aim of the contest should be and not incentivize attempting to win via decision.
 

TheAwkwardTitan

IQ = 209
Jan 30, 2016
1,912
3,334
Even if you disagree, this is a far more hysterical response than my relatively benign, mild argument warrants (hint: the 'Just Bleed guy' reference was a joke). What I am calling for is hardly some ridiculous fantasy system - it's basically what we used to have, just better. I agree with the new criteria to a large extent. It should be emphasized that damage is the most important aspect of fighting and it's good that we try to avoid Leonard Garcia and Diego Sanchez pulling out bullshit decisions by 'moving forward' while getting lit the fuck up. But that doesn't mean the wording can't be tweaked a little to reward aggression a little more while still emphasizing that damage is the most important thing.

And LOL at 'hit piece on the unified rules'. What is it, a sacred religious text to you? That's genuinely hilarious.

You're also assuming that this post is about Romero-Adesanya, but it's only very tangentially related in the sense that a counterstriker won a close decision and it reminded me to make a point I have made multiple times in the past. Romero didn't do jack shit either, so I'm obviously not arguing that he had 'effectvie aggression' anyway. I thought he won under the current rules - damage in rounds 1, 2 and 5. So that has nothing to do with this argument.

'Furthermore we shouldn't encourage fighters to compromise themselves for entertainment from a rules perspective'.

It's cage fighting. They are already compromised. You're acting as if a minor wording tweak is suddenly going to mean that these guys are going to be rushing in like spastics. We would only see a minor adaptation in fighting styles.

The flaw in the current rules is that it doesn't allow judges to penalize guys based on something that the actual rules prohibit - timidity. In an extreme case, judges would be forced to potentially reward behavior that should have resulted in a disqualification. Judging should be seen as a necessary evil - something we use because time constraints and attention spans prevent a product where a win is necessarily a finish. Therefore judging criteria should more heavily reward guys for trying to get that proper win, because that's what the aim of the contest should be and not incentivize attempting to win via decision.
"What I am calling for is hardly some ridiculous fantasy system - it's basically what we used to have, just better."

And you go on to highlight that damage is more important. Okay damage is more important we agree on that. How about strikes landed? That's a significant metric, certainly more significant than aggression. So we've established landing strikes and doing damage are more important than aggression, so where is there room to make aggression hold more weight as a criteria? If aggression takes a back seat to everything (which it should) there's not a logical way to use the old rules and make them "better." The only way you could do that is if aggression outweighs the aforementioned factors, and it never will unless the UFC time travels and changes it's name to Pride.

"You're also assuming that this post is about Romero-Adesanya"

It is.

"but it's only very tangentially related"

Ducks quack. It is.

"It's cage fighting. They are already compromised. You're acting as if a minor wording tweak is suddenly going to mean that these guys are going to be rushing in like spastics. We would only see a minor adaptation in fighting styles."

The fact that they're already compromised changes nothing. NFL players are compromised so why don't they just say fuck it and ask for more helmet to helmet contact. See how that works?

"Therefore judging criteria should more heavily reward guys for trying to get that proper win, because that's what the aim of the contest should be and not incentivize attempting to win via decision."

Fighters get warnings if they refuse to engage for extended periods of time, but that's as far as we should really go. We've already established that there's no way to make aggression a more pressing metric when the other metrics innately outweigh it. As I've already pointed out the fighters are incentivized via bonuses and fan support, but other than that there's no logical way to make fighters pull a Max Holloway. Some fights are boring, some fighters are okay, and some fights are great. That's just how it is, and a rule tweak that holds zero weight won't change that. If you can Mayweather yourself to a decision you should, and it's on the opponent to not let that happen by cutting the cage/ring and actually landing shots. It's not on the criteria to tell fighters to put themselves in bad spots, or change their fighting style.
 

Sheepdog

Protecting America from excessive stool loitering
Dec 1, 2015
8,912
14,237
"What I am calling for is hardly some ridiculous fantasy system - it's basically what we used to have, just better."

And you go on to highlight that damage is more important. Okay damage is more important we agree on that. How about strikes landed? That's a significant metric, certainly more significant than aggression. So we've established landing strikes and doing damage are more important than aggression, so where is there room to make aggression hold more weight as a criteria? If aggression takes a back seat to everything (which it should) there's not a logical way to use the old rules and make them "better." The only way you could do that is if aggression outweighs the aforementioned factors, and it never will unless the UFC time travels and changes it's name to Pride.

"You're also assuming that this post is about Romero-Adesanya"

It is.

"but it's only very tangentially related"

Ducks quack. It is.

"It's cage fighting. They are already compromised. You're acting as if a minor wording tweak is suddenly going to mean that these guys are going to be rushing in like spastics. We would only see a minor adaptation in fighting styles."

The fact that they're already compromised changes nothing. NFL players are compromised so why don't they just say fuck it and ask for more helmet to helmet contact. See how that works?

"Therefore judging criteria should more heavily reward guys for trying to get that proper win, because that's what the aim of the contest should be and not incentivize attempting to win via decision."

Fighters get warnings if they refuse to engage for extended periods of time, but that's as far as we should really go. We've already established that there's no way to make aggression a more pressing metric when the other metrics innately outweigh it. As I've already pointed out the fighters are incentivized via bonuses and fan support, but other than that there's no logical way to make fighters pull a Max Holloway. Some fights are boring, some fighters are okay, and some fights are great. That's just how it is, and a rule tweak that holds zero weight won't change that. If you can Mayweather yourself to a decision you should, and it's on the opponent to not let that happen by cutting the cage/ring and actually landing shots. It's not on the criteria to tell fighters to put themselves in bad spots, or change their fighting style.
LOL. Again with the overly hysterical response.

It's really not that difficult to re-word the rules. You could change the direction for 'effective aggression' from 'only to be assessed if striking/grappling is 100% equal' to 'cannot be assessed if effective striking/grappling advantage is significant' or perhaps some other wording. Then the rules could make clear 'judges are to focus on effective striking/grappling when assessing the fight but may consider effective aggression if the effective striking/grappling differential is marginal'. In effect, this is likely how many judges are already scoring fights, as '100% equal' is oddly specific for such a subjective assessment anyway (what if it was only 99.99% equal?). It would just stop other judges from too rigidly ignoring effective aggression.

The current tiered criteria has only been in place for a few years. You're acting like it's infallible gospel and the only way to score fights. The old system was too open, this one is too rigid. What I am proposing is allowing judges a little more leeway to reward aggression while still making it crystal clear that damage is the most important criterion. That's really not an unreasonable position.

You could argue this wording complicates things. It absolutely does. But if we have to write criteria for judges whose IQ is below 85 and who can't understand basic concepts, then that's our fucking problem in the first place. No criteria is going to solve retarded judges.
 

madmav

Posting Machine
Jan 29, 2016
1,998
2,212
remove the rounds.. a 3 round fight should just be a 15 min fight.. 5 round main event or title fight.. 15 min round with a 10 championship round. have refs deduct points for inactivity or wall n stall.. mma needs to go back to it's organic roots and not the current copy boxing system with boxing oriented commissions and judges
 

jason73

Yuri Bezmenov was right
First 100
Jan 15, 2015
72,781
134,158
strikes landed is a dumb stat. 10 pillow punches shouldnt count for more than 9 hard shots
 

BeardOfKnowledge

The Most Consistent Motherfucker You Know
Jul 22, 2015
60,547
56,268
Judging is subjective and judges are corrupt morons, so we will never 'fix' judging. But judging at the very lest should serve the purpose of rewarding people for fighting how we want them to fight. We should not reward guys for running away.

The MMA judging criteria was changed to basically assert 'damage is king'. They simplified the rules in an effort to get judges to stop being completely subjective in what they score, and to an extent it was a wise move. But they went too far.

The problem is, this system allows for guys to run away, barely hurt their opponent and still win. This should not be the case. You should be allowed to counterstrike and win, but it should be premised on you landing substantially - not just 'barely' - more damage to compensate for the fact that the other fighter took more risks and allowed for an actual fight to take place.

I genuinely blame Floyd Mayweather for this cultural shift. In order to sell Floyd PPVs, an entire generation was turned into retarded hipsters who thought they were smart for paying 70 bucks to watch a 'defensive genius' win socrecards while never hurting his opponent in terrible fights. That has spilled over into MMA.

We should judge fights more like how the 'Just Bleed' guy would judge fights, because it makes for better fights.
You're really ready to die on this hill, aren't you?