Actual fight analysis: Conor cheating... Herb ignoring

[Myrddin Wild]

Khabib had a 10-8 Round 2

I dispute that. Most of the round was pitty pat & positioning. Khabib did some decent gnp at one point and also landed a nice shot that "staggered" Conor... (not even a knock down) & Conor returned fire immediately with a knee.

I'm a big advocate of knockdowns being scored heavily. Like when Conor put Nate on his ass. That was a real knockdown. Nate's nervous system shut down to where his legs no longer functioned. Conor just took a good shot that staggered him back, but he never even went down. That is not the same thing as a legit knockdown. It was a hell of a shot & kudoz to Khabib for landing it, but in no way does it signify a 10/8 with a lot of ground stalling for position & one little rally of decent gnp. It was a clear 10-9 for sure... but you really gotta do something special to get to a 10-8 & stalling while lobbying for position does not fit the bill.

 

[det_regnar_på_vår_kärlek]

This thread should be pinned in the main page

 

[JSF]

I dispute that. Most of the round was pitty pat & positioning. Khabib did some decent gnp at one point and also landed a nice shot that "staggered" Conor... (not even a knock down) & Conor returned fire immediately with a knee.

I'm a big advocate of knockdowns being scored heavily. Like when Conor put Nate on his ass. That was a real knockdown. Nate's nervous system shut down to where his legs no longer functioned. Conor just took a good shot that staggered him back, but he never even went down. That is not the same thing as a legit knockdown. It was a hell of a shot & kudoz to Khabib for landing it, but in no way does it signify a 10/8 with a lot of ground stalling for position & one little rally of decent gnp. It was a clear 10-9 for sure... but you really gotta do something special to get to a 10-8 & stalling while lobbying for position does not fit the bill.

Historically it could be a 10-9, but the movement was for more 10-8 right?

It makes sense if you compare the rounds. If Rounds 1 and 3 were 10-9s, then for sure Round 2 should indicate a greater difference. Round 1 and round 2 earning the same score doesn’t feel it makes sense, right?

 

[Myrddin Wild]

Historically it could be a 10-9, but the movement was for more 10-8 right?

It makes sense if you compare the rounds. If Rounds 1 and 3 were 10-9s, then for sure Round 2 should indicate a greater difference. Round 1 and round 2 earning the same score doesn’t feel it makes sense, right?

Your reference is about how one round was more dominant than a close round, & so they should be scored different. & I agree with you on that. It's the greatest flaw of "the 10/9 must" scoring system. HOWEVER.... the subtle differences you're describing are not covered even in the new rules for a 10/8. A judge looks at a round in and among itself. He doesn't put 2 round together & recognize that one of them was won by a larger margin and so that one gets a 10/8... no... that's not how it works. You really gotta dominate or do special things consistantly. Khabib had one nice shot that staggered but didn't drop Mac. & he had one flurry of gnp. The rest was stalling & positioning. That is not what a 10/8 is designed for... Even under the new rules. You can't just have "a really good round" & expect a 10/8. That round will be scored exactly the same as a razor close round. 10/9.

Another thing is... The new rules are fooking stupid in how they are distributed. It's about as clear as mud how it goes down... but after making my best research on the the subject, I think I've come down with a little bit of reasoning behind some of this stuff.

The new judging rules are based on whether or not a particular commission has adopted the new rules or not... & some have adopted the new fighting rules, but not the new judging rules... & the confusion doesn't even come close to stopping there. There are "local" judges... & there are "traveling" judges. Any local judge will go strictly with the rules of their local commission. However, a traveling judge will be more free to judge how he sees fit regardless of which system a particular local suggests. So in otherwords, you could be in a local that supports the easier 10/8's but one or 2 of the judges don't like that rule so they don't do it. Vice Versa is also true.

So as best as I can tell... we are still too new in this sport (obviously) to have a standardized set of rules in which people judge a fight by.

Now all that said... I don't think it waz a 10/8 under any rule set. My last post pretty clearly described my point of view on how Khabib did not do enough for a 10/8... even under the new rules.

Here is my last post for reference - http://forums.sherdog.com/posts/145460123/

Just so you know... Nevada is under the old rules. Where you practically have to kill the guy to get a 10/8

 

[ANIM4L]

A 10 – 8 Round in MMA is where one fighter wins the round by a large margin. A 10 – 8 round in MMA is not the most common score a judge will render, but it is absolutely essential to the evolution of the sport and the fairness to the fighters that judges understand and effectively utilize the score of 10 – 8. A score of 10 – 8 does not require a fighter to dominate their opponent for 5 minutes of a round. The score of 10 – 8 is utilized by the judge when the judge sees verifiable results on the part of both or either fighter. If a fighter has little to no offensive output during a 5 minute round, it should be normal for the judge to award the losing fighter 8 points instead of 9.

When assessing a score of 10-8, judges shall evaluate Damage, Dominance, and Duration and, if two of the 3 are assessed to have been present, a 10-8 score shall be considered. If all three are present, a 10-8 score shall be awarded.

Damage – A judge shall assess if a fighter damages their opponent significantly in the round, even though they may not have dominated the action. Damage includes visible evidence such as swellings and lacerations. Damage shall also be assessed when a fighter’s actions, using striking and/or grappling, lead to a diminishing of their opponents’ energy, confidence, abilities and spirit. All of these come as a direct result of damage. When a fighter is damaged with strikes, by lack of control and/or ability, this can create defining moments in the round and shall be assessed with great value.

Dominance – As MMA is an offensive based sport, dominance of a round can be seen in striking when the losing fighter is forced to continually defend, with no counters or reaction taken when openings present themselves. Dominance in the grappling phase can be seen by fighter staking dominant positions in the fight and utilizing those positions to attempt fight ending submissions or attacks. Merely holding a dominant position(s) shall not be a primary factor in assessing dominance. What the fighter does with those positions is what must be assessed.

Duration – Duration is defined by the time spent by one fighter effectively attacking and controlling their opponent, while the opponent offers little to no offensive output. A judge shall assess duration by recognizing the relative time in a round when one fighter takes and maintains full control of the effective offense. This can be assessed both standing and grounded.

10–7 Round

A 10 – 7 Round in MMA is when a fighter completely overwhelms their opponent in Effective Striking and/or Grappling and stoppage is warranted.A 10 – 7 round in MMA is a score that judges will rarely give

http://www.abcboxing.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/2017-Official-MMA-Judging-Criteria.pdf

 

[shankmcgank]

All the buzz is about what happened after the fight. This post is about the fight.

Just wanted to point out the fouls Conor committed, which were ignored by Herb Dean (time stamps for reference) and other oddities by Herb:

- SHORTS GRABBING
allowing McG from the moment Khabib grabbed that first single leg in the middle of the cage, to getting dragged to fence, to defending guard pass along the fence). These are just the instances where the camera CAUGHT the short grabbing:
Rd 1: 4:16
Rd 1: 4:03
Rd 1: 3:58
Rd 1: 3:10 - Herb actually addresses this one

Funny part is, is that Joe Rogan and everyone says that Conor "didn't do that bad at escaping damage in Round 1"... but take a closer look, and it's only because he was clearly CHEATING THE ENTIRE TIME by grabbing the shorts!

Notice, after Herb addressed the short grabbing, Khabib sliced through McG's guard like butter and was able to start landing shots and implement his smothering game.

- NOT STOPPING FIGHT
Herb not stopping fight - as he's had in the past NUMEROUS times - when McG was getting pounded on against cage in Rd 2. You can feel that if the roles were reversed, and McG was pounding away at Khabib like that, nobody would be surprised if Herb stopped right there.

This is uncharacteristic of Herb (who if anything is known to stop fights EARLY), and follows his LATE LATE LATE stoppage on the Dolloway vs Muliev fight too

- ILLEGAL KNEE
to Khabib's face while in bottom side control. Herb actually points to Conor warn him, but this wasn't an accidental knee due to timing, this was a blatant intentional foul
Rd 2 1:36

- TOES IN FENCE
warning McG about toes in fence, but then does nothing as it's blatantly abused for the entire sequence:
Rd 2 1:31 - was warned by Herb who actually touched the toes... but then Herb did NOTHING when McG continued!
Rd 2 1:26 - 1:19
Rd 2 1:15 - 0:57 - this foul allowed McG to push off and escape the bottom!

- 12-6 ELBOWS (TO BACK OF HEAD):
Rd 2 0:39
Rd 2 0:09

- GLOVE GRABBING
allowing McG to grab gloves at end of round 3 (which pissed Khabib off)
Rd 3 0:24 - until the end of the round

Dominic points this out, Khabib complains to Herb at the 0:09 mark... and all Herb says is "keep fighting"?

The round ends, and Khabib has a few choice words for Conor and Herb.

THIS IS THE MOMENT THAT KHABIB STARTS TO RAGE, AND *DECIDES* TO FINISH McG. I'm thinking that up to this point, Khabib was content to take this to a dominant UD win... but after realizing that Conor was cheating and Herb was letting him get away with it, this is where he decided he was going to finish him. Sure enough, he did.

Between Rd 3 and 4, you can hear him complain to his corner:

"3 TIMES HE CHEAT, 3 TIMES!" [points to Conor or Herb across the cage) "YES (YOU)!"
(guessing he's now talking to Herb off camera)
"SHOULD BE 2 TIMES TAKE 1 POINT!"


So these are just fouls is just up until Round 3. In Round 4, the cheating continued:

- FENCE GRAB TO AVOID TAKEDOWN
blatant fence grab to avoid takedown (which failed, and was the start of the end... but still a foul)
Rd 4 3:18


So my points?

1) What is going on, Herb? Is this personal bias? Instruction from Dana to help Conor? Have money riding on this fight? What?!?

2) Angry Khabib is a scary, scary dude! He still had fight left in him after the neck crank finish - I think he wanted the beating to continue, but he was fed up and still upset after he had won. Danis and Khabib then talked shit to each other through the cage...

... and we all know what happened after that.

Regardless of what happened after the fight, Khabib dominated this fight. You could argue McG won Round 3, but Khabib had a 10-8 Round 2, and I think it's believable that Khabib took Round 3 off to rest and strike with Conor because of the Round 2 knockdown and he felt that Conor's power was already sapped - so he did similar to what he did with Al Iaquinta and played the standup game a bit because he felt safe, and wanted to prove a point that he has stand-up skills too.

Please send this to Dana and company via Instagram or Twitter. I'd love to see if they bother replying, and if they do, what they have to say about it.