Anyone else agree with Tony Weeks? (Finney vs Valentin)

[Ares Black]

We really get to see who the crotch sniffers are if they thought Finney won that fight. The 2nd round is the only round that you could even think about giving to Finney but he still lost that round. I mean it's this a fight or some dry humping league? 1 and 3 has to be for Valentin as he was the only one to land any significant strikes.

Finney had 5 takedowns in round one and dominated the grappling. Scoring the first for Valentin is idiotic.

You literally do not understand how to score MMA fights.

 

[BluMax]

The refs need cards to speed up these fights. Last night, there were many opportunities for yellow cards.

These one-dimensional fighters are cancer to the sport. They have no place in a UFC-level promotion.

Both fighters fucked up. Finney couldn't capitalize on a takedown. Valentin's takedown defence was amateur at best. He knew he was up against a wrestler and should have been training for that.

 

[Pequeño Corey]

Effective Grappling is literally the primary scoring criteria. It is equal with Effective Striking.

Ok

 

[bigfootsbreath]

Finney had a couple of cuts and bruises. He was bleeding at the end of the fight. Not sure if valentine was. So there's some argument to be made that Valentine caused more damage at least in one round.

But does a half ass elbow to the cheek while trying to (unsuccessfully) defend a takedown qualify as damage?

So you saying landing baby strikes should be ignored and the round should instead be given to the guy who lands no strikes whatsoever, who only hugged the opponents asshoe?

 

[Ares Black]

So you saying landing baby strikes should be ignored and the round should instead be given to the guy who lands no strikes whatsoever, who only hugged the opponents asshoe?

You don't understand the scoring criteria.

Finney dominated the grappling and neither fighter landed any particularly damaging strikes.

Feel free to give Valentin the third round. Giving him either of the first two is silly.

 

[bigfootsbreath]

Finney had 5 takedowns in round one and dominated the grappling. Scoring the first for Valentin is idiotic.

You literally do not understand how to score MMA fights.

Oh wow he sniffted a guy's crotch! Sniffing on a crotch does no damage. Valentin landed actual strikes to dudes head, which actually causes damage. Flights are based off damage, not how hard you sniff on crotch. I get that you are bias for anything male crotch but in a fight strikes trump crotch sniffers. Maybe you should just go back to your gay porn hub desires.

 

[Ares Black]

Oh wow he sniffted a guy's crotch! Sniffing on a crotch does no damage. Valentin landed actual strikes to dudes head, which actually causes damage. Flights are based off damage, not how hard you sniff on crotch. I get that you are bias for anything male crotch but in a fight strikes trump crotch sniffers. Maybe you should just go back to your gay porn hub desires.

No, I just understand what I am watching, and you do not.

It wasn't a fun fight, but Torrez Finney very clearly won. It's not particularly debatable and anyone who scored it for Valentin doesn't understand the scoring criteria, simple as that.

 

[FreedomCricket]

So you saying landing baby strikes should be ignored and the round should instead be given to the guy who lands no strikes whatsoever, who only hugged the opponents asshoe?

I'm saying are the baby strikes enough to be considered effective striking? Or should they be ignored. If damage in the round is the primary factor but there didn't appear to be any damage, then it goes to effective striking and/or grappling. Then aggression and octogon control as the secondary factors. Finney definitely had control time and was aggressive in his take downs.

Because Finney's grappling WAS effective enough to stop Valentine from doing anything significant offensively.

I'm not saying it was a fun fight to watch or that the result was wrong. Frankly, I'm indifferent to this fight.

If finney is fixin' to pick all his opponents up and drop them on their head though, combined with actual GnP, that will be worthy to watch. I'm assuming he's still bagging groceries somewhere and not training full time though.

 

[BFoe]

Oh wow he sniffted a guy's crotch! Sniffing on a crotch does no damage. Valentin landed actual strikes to dudes head, which actually causes damage. Flights are based off damage, not how hard you sniff on crotch. I get that you are bias for anything male crotch but in a fight strikes trump crotch sniffers. Maybe you should just go back to your gay porn hub desires.

No, this is wrong, you are misunderstanding the scoring criteria.

“Effective striking is judged solely by determining the impact/effect of legal strikes landed by a contestant solely based on the results of such legal strikes.”

In this case, those strikes had no effect that changed the direction of a fight. What determined he direction of rd 1 was Finney’s effective grappling, which is a coequal criteria. To say “grappling didn’t do damage but punches hurt therefore Punchy Guy wins the round” is wrong. That’s not how it is supposed to be scored.

https://www.abcboxing.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/unified-rules-mma-july-2022.pdf

 

[Ares Black]

No, this is wrong, you are misunderstanding the scoring criteria.

“Effective striking is judged solely by determining the impact/effect of legal strikes landed by a contestant solely based on t(e results of such legal strikes.”

In this case, those strikes had no effect that changed the direction of a fight. What determined he direction of rd 1 was Finney’s effective grappling, which is a coequal criteria. To say “grappling didn’t do damage but punches hurt therefore Punchy Guy wins the round” is wrong. That’s not how it is supposed to be scored.

https://www.abcboxing.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/unified-rules-mma-july-2022.pdf

Who was doing what they wanted to be doing?

 

[Ares Black]

I'm saying are the baby strikes enough to be considered effective striking? Or should they be ignored. If damage in the round is the primary factor but there didn't appear to be any damage, then it goes to effective striking and/or grappling. Then aggression and octogon control as the secondary factors. Finney definitely had control time and was aggressive in his take downs.

Because Finney's grappling WAS effective enough to stop Valentine from doing anything significant offensively.

I'm not saying it was a fun fight to watch or that the result was wrong. Frankly, I'm indifferent to this fight.

If finney is fixin' to pick all his opponents up and drop them on their head though, combined with actual GnP, that will be worthy to watch. I'm assuming he's still bagging groceries somewhere and not training full time though.

He turned pro in February of 2022. He's still very green. He also has 8 finishes in his 11 pro wins.

 

[Safton]

Valentin won Round 3 all day. Finney took Round 2.

Round 1 though... I think you have to remember that "significant strike" is an effectively meaningless term at the end of the day. It's just something that the UFC statisticians come up with and arbitrarily decide on in the moment. It has no bearing on scoring.

People forget that techniques are scored by their impactful results. What impactful results did Valentin achieve with his strikes in Rounds 1 and 2? Sure, Finney didn't really mount attacks from his takedowns, but at least he effectively neutered his opponent's offense and dictated the pace & location at which the fight took place whilst achieving advantageous positions... that sounds like nominally "Effective Grappling", albeit the most absolutely low-level and boring style of such.

If Valentin had been splitting Finney open from the bottom with elbows or rocking him with upkicks/hammerfists or something, absolutely give him those fucking rounds. But the fact that he nominally landed X amount more (utterly ineffective) strikes because a spreadsheet tells us he did and thus did "MOAR DAMAGE" is a pretty silly way of determining that he won a fight IMO... it's ironically dragging the dreaded CompuBox logic of Tony Weeks' beloved sport into the UFC.

In addition, it's pretty well-established that when nothing much happens in the Effective Striking/Grappling or when the two are essentially equal, you go to the secondary and then tertiary scoring criteria of Effective Aggression followed thereafter by Octagon Control:

"Effective aggressiveness means aggressively making attempts to finish the fight."

"Fighting area control is assessed by determining who is dictating the pace, place and position of the bout."

I guess you could make an argument that Valentin was "more aggressive" because he was throwing more strikes and these had more chance to create an opening to finish the fight, but I don't think that argument holds water. After all, Finney had all the forward pressure, executed a high-amplitude slam or two (something we have seen have fight-finishing implications), and again the qualifier is effective while Robert's baby strikes in Round 1 were anything but. Once you get to Octagon Control it's no contest, all Finney. He chose literally everything about how and where the round took place.

Furthermore, things like Dominance & Duration are part of the scoring metrics. Dominance explicitly states that you look for a fighter to set up impactful strikes/submission attacks from dominant positions rather than simply holding said positions, but then goes on to state that this is merely the primary thing a judge should be looking for -- it's not the end all, be all. A fighter can still assert Dominance in an MMA scoring context by consistently keeping their opponent in a "defensive or reactive mode" through constant positional changes. Finney more or less did that in Round 1 with his mat returns. This isn't even mentioning Duration, which states that the time spent "effectively attacking, controlling, or impacting one's opponent" is part of the scoring criteria, too.

At the end of the day, a big part of me expected this to happen after Valentin got fucked up by Loder. I picked Robert to win on a hunch and was sort of rooting for him, but I really don't think he did. The guy got smushed for 10 minutes. I don't mind giving him Round 1 and you can certainly make an argument for doing so... but I don't think that those strikes he was landing were sufficiently "impactful and effective" to make up for getting tossed around like an unruly child and pancaked against the cage for minutes at a time. Especially since "cumulative impact" is a thing per the Rules, getting mat-returned hurts, and having your energy reserves sapped by what the other guy is doing to you is also scoreable.

 

[yossarian1979]

Then you should learn how to score fights properly. You are going to rob people of their victory.

I look at it as the old rules would have Finney winning, but the criteria does in fact state damage above everything, therefore, according to that, I feel Valentin won. Appreciate your input.

 

[Ares Black]

I look at it as the old rules would have Finney winning, but the criteria does in fact state damage above everything, therefore, according to that, I feel Valentin won. Appreciate your input.

That's simply not true. You really need to learn the scoring criteria if you are going to be judging fights.

The primary scoring criteria is Effective Striking/Effective Grappling, with equal weight to both.

If someone dominates the grappling and his (dominated) opponent does a bit of damage to him in the process, the dominant grappler still wins the round.

 

[jmboyd24]

I look at it as the old rules would have Finney winning, but the criteria does in fact state damage above everything, therefore, according to that, I feel Valentin won. Appreciate your input.

Yep, effective striking/effective grappling is the old system. The question that you have to ask in his situation is did Finney's takedowns do more damage than the strikes landed by Valentin. Holding a dude against the cage means nothing

 

[Ares Black]

 

[Ares Black]

Yep, effective striking/effective grappling is the old system. The question that you have to ask in his situation is did Finney's takedowns do more damage than the strikes landed by Valentin. Holding a dude against the cage means nothing

Wrong. Effective Striking/Effective Grappling is still the primary scoring criteria.

https://www.abcboxing.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/unified-mma-rules-rev-july-2024.pdf

 

[yossarian1979]

That's simply not true. You really need to learn the scoring criteria if you are going to be judging fights.

The primary scoring criteria is Effective Striking/Effective Grappling, with equal weight to both.

If someone dominates the grappling and his (dominated) opponent does a bit of damage to him in the process, the dominant grappler still wins the round.

So here's the thing, I don't disagree with you, and I'm not trying to sound retarded, but at least for amateur rules, damage trumps that. Like for instance, fighter A dominates the grappling, getting takedowns, control, but hasn't hit anything significant at all damage wise. The opponent hits a few elbows from bottom, but is clearly being dominated grappling wise, he still wins.
I don't really agree fully, but those are the criteria. I think the rules need updating putting an emphasis on blending both more.

 

[BFoe]

I look at it as the old rules would have Finney winning, but the criteria does in fact state damage above everything, therefore, according to that, I feel Valentin won. Appreciate your input.

No, it doesn’t state damage above everything else. Visible damage is a part of assessing how effective striking was, as is diminishing an opponent’s “energy, confidence, abilities, and spirit.”
It doesn’t say damage above everything, and certainly not “things that can hurt like punches do” above everything.

 

[Neck&Neck]

Tony Weeks is a legend
Best judge in the business