Bisping: Judges and refs need to be held accountable

If you are a fighter and make a mistake, the consequences are vast. You lose. If you are lucky it was a submission; maybe you get knocked out and have a concussion. You lose half your pay. Your next fight there is no pay increase. Your future job prospects are dimmed. There is a heavy, heavy price for mistakes.

Being a referee in mixed martial arts is among the most thankless tasks in the entire field. Refs have to maintain an impossible balance between a fighter’s livelihood and a fighter’s health, in a dangerous game. And potentially career-altering decisions must be made in a split second. When everything goes perfectly, the referee is invisible. So for all the extraordinary skills it requires, the average referee is known best by their perceived errors.

Still, if you are a referee and you make a mistake, you don’t lose half your pay; and then again referees become actually hundredaires after each fight, and occasionally edge above $1,000. If your job prospects dim, it is very, very slowly, over time. The most immediate negative thing that happens is a lot of mean comments on the Internet.

During his latest Believe You Me podcast, UFC middleweight champion Michael Bisping argued that there needs to be some accountability for refs and judges. His remarks were occasioned by the early stoppage by Mario Yamasaki of Michael Chiesa vs. Kevin Lee at UFC Fight Night 112 on Sunday.

A guy with the experience of Yamasaki, when it’s a main event, I think he messed up,” began Bisping, as transcribed by Jed Meshew for MMA Fighting. “I think he messed up and he should have let the fight go a few seconds longer. And I’m only talking a few seconds. As fighters, we train for God knows how long for these fights and generally, the way payment is structured within the UFC is 50-50, 50 percent to show and 50 percent to win. That’s generally how it starts. So not only has he lost the fight, not only does he have another loss on his record, but he lost half his salary.

I’ll tell you what I think needs to happen. Listen, I like Mario Yamasaki. He’s been a good referee over the years but when you make a mistake like that I feel that people need to be held accountable. If we make mistakes in the cage as fighters, we are held accountable. If we break the rules, if we flaunt the rules and the authority, then we are often given a fine. . . And if you fail to make weight, 20 percent to 25 percent is taken in some cases. My point is, officials need to be held accountable as well. So Mario Yamasaki should have to sit down with the commission – I’m not trying to get him into any s***, I’m not trying to cost him his job, he’s a very good referee – but he has to explain his position on why he did that.

Also, judges. Judges are the scourge of this sport and often you will find a fight happens and one guy clearly dominates and the judges score that fight 30-27, 30-27 but then the third judge will score it 30-27 for the other person. So I think in those circumstances, judges that clearly, clearly made a very controversial call, which went against the grain of the other judges, they should have to sit down in a room with some other judges or the commission or whoever it is – maybe the UFC – watch the fight with some other people, and at the end of that round, explain why he scored that round a 10-9 for the guy that he said won it. And if he can’t give a very good reason why it was a 10-9, then it’s very simple. Either he wasn’t paying attention and he made a guess, either he’s not capable of doing the job at hand, or he’s a dodgy judge.

But they should have to do that and if they can’t make a good explanation for why they scored that fight that way then they should either be fired or face some sort of disciplinary action. This is serious business with fighting. We sacrifice all this time and this is people’s careers and 50 percent of their pay on the line and then for some f***in’ a**hole judge to come in and give an absolutely ridiculous scoring, they need to be held accountable.

Bisping is currently recovering from a knee injury and will likely defend his belt in the fall.