Close rounds are ruining the sport. They should be scored 10-10.

[Oldman1]

The round length is too long for a human judge. Split the round scoring into two score. First and second half.

 

[cooks1]

Definitely this. Like you said, even in team sports it's horrible. Umprire strike zones, ridiculous pass interference calls, awful ticky tack fouls everytime you breathe on Lebron. Its ridiculous. I have no idea how to fix all that though

You can't fix it. You accept it as part of the game and you legislate for it. Especially in boxing/MMA.

A few things I think could at least mitigate the problems are changing the # of rounds and minutes per round, as well as changing the # of judges.

Have non-title fights be 5 X 4 minute rounds and Championship fights be 7 x 4 minute rounds. With a little more fight time and # of rounds, there will be more data to assess. And adding 2 more judges would hopefully mitigate subjective outliers.

 

[Docrob2354]

A sudden death round would be awesome. No excuse for coasting and thinking you did enough.

not sure you would want to call it sudden death in a combat sport. maybe sudden victory like in the ultimate fighter.

 

[BabyBlue_Bomber]

This would probably lead to more draws, especially in a 3 round fight.

Which isn’t a bad thing...

But, that could lead to rematches and contenders taking longer to move up or down the rankings ladder...

Draws could potentially stagnate a division more than injuries do.

 

[PalmStrike]

If I was a judge Id have a system where I not only judge the round for a winner but also stay alert for a signifigant or out of the ordinary action to decide who a close round goes to.

Example:

Wand and Huto have an extremely close round but Hunto executed the Atomic Butt Drop and therefore gets the round.

 

[J0N0]

An athletic competition without a winner seems pointless no?

Most of the world are used to watching soccer where about a quarter of the results are draws. I think it's an American thing to not accept ties.

Imo it's more pointless picking a winner pretty much at random. You can see as a viewer if a fight's incredibly close, I don't see how awarding a victory due to guess work changes achieves anything other than shafting one of the participants.

 

[christer]

"Dont leave it in the hands of close rounds"

 

[Not A Real Fan]

Then you endup with draws...controversial draws btw, cause there is no way they did exactly the same, am i right?...

In my opinion, a draw is not just a 50/50 fight. I don't know where to draw the line but a 51/49 fight is still a draw. You cant "win" by an inch or a hair.

An otherwise even round should not have a winner just because one fighter landed that a clean stiff jab at 1:43 of the round.

 

[Foppa21]

How does one determine a close round then?

 

[DOZERR]

They need to start using more numbers in the 10 point must system other than just 9 and 10. Think about how rare a 10-8 round is. In reality a 10-8 round should be the norm for a round where a fighter clearly won, 10-9 should be when there's more of a back and forth but you still know for sure one guy won the round. 10-6/10-7 should become the new 10-8.

 

[AP_RESURRECTION]

The mob needs a winner and loser. One to laud and one to put down. The uncertainty of a draw doesn’t work. Maybe it would be better for educated fans but we are outnumbered by the mob. Mob needs someone to put down and someone to laud.

 

[Rod Farva]

Or scrap the round by round scoring all together and judge the fight in its entirety

 

[Bowel-forged Stool]

Wish I could score my wife a 10-10

 

[SaigeVanZant]

Hell no. There would be like 6 draws a card

 

[Kneeuinthenutz]

The fundamental problem with the MMA scoring system has been the same problem since they day they adopted the 10-9 must rules.

The problem being you're using a 10-9 must scoring system based on points, and round by round scoring.

It simply doesn't, hasn't, and never will work, and it's beyond laughable they continue to run a "sport" under these rules.

The fight should be judged as a whole after proper criteria is established. It would solve virtually every problem that currently exists.