OPINION: 15 elements of MMA that ought to be changed for the benefit of the sport – week 6

There are certain aspects of mixed martial arts that simply make no sense.

And when my lovable colleague Pat McCarry took a look at the 15 ways that rugby could be improved, it struck a chord with me and made me think that, as physical as rugby is, MMA is far more dangerous and needs some improvement in pretty much all areas. There are elements of the sport that are still counter-intuitive when it comes to fighter safety, fan enjoyment and the overall legitimisation of the sport. I would like to make it clear that this is very much an opinion piece and I've decided to drip feed my ideas for rule changes over 15 weeks and, while some of them are a little bit out there, I think that they just make sense to switch up. - In Week 1 we looked at how to deal with fighters missing weight - In Week 2 we supposed that concussive brain trauma would go down if fighters fought without gloves - In Week 3 we suggested a new initiative as to how the weight cut could be made safer for fighters - In week 4 we toyed with the idea of getting rid of the cage - In week 5, we reckoned more weight classes should be introduced

Week 6 - Judges

It should come as something of a prerequisite that mixed martial arts judges must have some kind of experience in the sport on which they're offering their decisions. That's quite simply not the case which is perplexing enough to knock me out of my office chair. So many MMA judges are crossover judges from boxing so have absolutely no idea how to determine the effectiveness of grappling techniques. There are certain judges who are literally clueless when it comes to submissions and don't know how close a submission is from completion (a very significant consideration when awarding a round to a fighter). ALL judges should either be ex-fighters or MMA trainers because they're the only people who truly know all disciplines of mixed martial arts and how to award points on them accordingly. For fighters, it must be such a relief to look at the judges' table and see someone like Ricardo Almeida (an accomplished Jiu-Jitsu competitor and ex-UFC fighter) and know that you're in safe hands. We've seen so many stinkers of decisions in recent years with Beneil Dariush's split decision victory over Michael Johnson the most recent but it's nowhere near a new phenomenon as Nam Phan, Shogun Rua and Evan Dunham have all been screwed out of winner's bonuses over the years. While a lot of shitty decisions must come down to the ludicrously unsuitable ten point must system which we examine in a few weeks, the personnel must surely shoulder some of the blame. There is the famous story told by Joe Rogan of a friend of his who was asked by a fellow judge at an MMA event what a certain fighter was doing when a kimura was being set up. The judge had no idea who was initiating the submission attempt. There is a lot of money on the line and the difference between winning and losing can lead to some hungry nights for fighters lower down the pecking order so why the decision-making ability lies in the incompetent hands of oblivious judges makes absolutely no sense. Athletic commissions need to get former coaches or competitors in the judges' seats and I'm sure you'll see much fewer "robberies." Come back next week when we make the argument for referee stand-ups being eliminated from MMA.