Joe Rogan comments on the state of judging in MMA, lobbies for trained judges and a change to the scoring system

UFC colour commentator, Joe Rogan has today been speaking about the state of judging in the sport of mixed martial arts, something that’s getting out of control as the weeks roll by and something he feels would benefit by two very sensible initiatives.
Speaking via MMAFighting.com, Rogan said:

“I think very clearly, the people that we have in the position of choosing judges and deciding how the judges’ criteria (and) the scoring criteria is set upon, they really don’t want to do anything about it. We know the Nevada State Athletic Commission is very aware that people are upset about it, yet they do nothing. It’s a political system, I think. Keith Kizer is a politician. If you step up and fire all these people that you’ve hired and had working for you for years, and you do make a big change, it opens you up for criticism.”

“What they basically have is a bunch of people who were boxing judges who really had no business even judging boxing. Boxing is a little easier to figure out if you’re not an athlete and not a competitor and not someone who really understands the game. It’s a little easier to figure out because it’s simply who hits who more. … Obviously there’s a little more to it than that, and that’s what makes bad decisions in boxing. But in MMA, it’s so much more complicated when you get takedowns and submission holds and what is worth more, a leg kick or a jab? Or what is worth more, a takedown or a knee or submission attempt from the bottom? Things get very squirrelly. It’s very hard to figure out.”

“I think, No. 1 – Ricardo Almeida said this recently and I absolutely agree – you should at least train to be a judge. I don’t think you can get away with judging professional mixed martial arts on the highest level without at least some sort of a martial arts background. You have to understand what’s happening when the fight goes to the ground. You have to have been leg kicked before. You can’t have judges around saying silly things like leg kicks don’t end fights, which they obviously do. You have to have a real love for the game.”

“I have friends who are judges and they’ve told me horror stories about people in the middle of huge fights that are televised on Spike TV or pay-per-view, and a judge looks over at him and goes, ‘What’s he doing?’ They don’t know. They literally have no idea. That’s ridiculous. That’s something that some day, we’re going to be laughing at. But right now we’re not laughing because we’ve got a real problem. And those people, all those terrible scorecards that have been handed down over and over again by the same judges? They’re still working. Every time I go to Nevada, I look over and they’re still there.”

“What do you have to do to get fired in Nevada? I don’t know what you have to do to get fired from the Nevada State Athletic Commission, but I think you have to kill somebody. I don’t think it’s as simple as, just be bad at judging.”

As time goes by and the sport only gets bigger it seems as if the problems are escalating, with a very questionable win being handed to Bellator’s featherweight champion, Joe Warren over Marcos Galvao just this past weekend. Is the way around this to firstly train the judges and introduce a new scoring system across the entire sport?