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Big John McCarthy critical of stand ups by other UFC refs

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Big John McCarthy critical of stand ups by other UFC refs
By Nate Wilcox on Feb 19, 1:56p 18

In an appearance on The MMA Hour, legendary UFC ref Big John McCarthy didn't hold back with his criticism of his fellow referees.

"Big" John McCarthy was the third man in the Octagon starting at UFC 2 and continuing for many many years until he walked away to try his hand at commentating. That didn't work out and he's back reffing, although not in Nevada where the NSAC doesn't care for his loose lips.

McCarthy was on the MMA Hour on Monday and made free with the criticism (transcribed by MMA Fighting):

"I will [only] stand a fight up when it's close to an even position," McCarthy said. "If you're in guard, or even half guard, and the action has stalled to the point, and I give you warnings [that] I need you to get busy and nothing really changes, you've shown me that you can't do anything, I'm going to stop you. I'm going to restart you. But if you get to dominant positions, be it side control, mount, back, the only way in the world that I would ever stand somebody up out of that, and I've done it once -- I tell this story, it's Jeremy Horn -- is if you go and clamp down and you're the one stalling the fight because you're not doing anything.

"You'll get fighters that'll sit there and they'll want you to stand them up, and you go, ‘There's no way in the world I'm standing you up.' Don't look to me to get you out of your problem. Get yourself out.

"If we start to take people out of those positions that are dominant, then we start to become unfair to the fight," McCarthy finished. "We give an advantage to one fighter over the other, and that's not our responsibility. That's not our job. We're doing something that's completely opposite of what we should be doing.

"You've got to have some compassion about how hard it is to do some of the things these [fighters] are trying to do, and doing it against a guy who knows what you're trying to do," McCarthy explained. "When you get guys in these mad scrambles and they'll finally end up in a position on the ground, and you'll see a referee come in and five second later [say], ‘Come one. Work.' It's like, ‘Jesus Christ, don't you think they just did? Wouldn't you be trying to get your heart rate back and breathe a little bit?' You've got to be reasonable when you're looking at things. Sometimes that's what separates the referees that fighters want to have doing their fights compared to others, because they understand the complexities of what's going on."

http://www.bloodyelbow.com/2013/2/19...other-ufc-refs

I could have died when Okami was stood up from side control against Belcher.

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You tell em Big J! Didn't know he was that eloquent, really well said.

Kinda makes you wonder if the other refs put a lot of $$$ in the fights they officiate. There are still a lot of gray areas in MMA reffing so it's easy to justify a BS call. Or maybe they just wanna make things more interesting for the mainstream fans who don't know shit about the ground game?

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Originally Posted by marky420 (Post 1816130)

Big John has some fighting experience and he knows his shit. Im sure some of these ref's havent had and maybe don't understand some positions on the ground properly.
Also as with referees in sports like soccer rules can be open to interpretation. Some refs like center stage and others will let things flow.

More refs need to have a good amount of BJJ experience, or at least knowledge.

We should just agree that if the fighter on the bottom has a solid guard and he is making it so the top fighter is locked down for ~5 seconds (or however long it takes to demonstrate control) then the fight gets stood up. In no other position should the fight ever be stood up.

That will solve the problem of lay and pray and the problem of the ref's discretion. Boom.

I gotta side with Joe Rogan on this one. There is no such thing as a good stand up. If you dont like having the guy on top of you, dont grab him and hold him, move him. And if you can't you lose. Now since we do have the rules that allow stand ups (for the audience purpose, not to make a fair fight) then yes there should be some sort of uniformity. I hate quick standups almost as bad as I hate quick stoppages. Sometimes you just need a little time to inch your way into a position as your opponent tires. Why stand it up for the benefit of the guy that got took down? But since we do, I think at LEAST 30 seconds of non action should take place before a stand up. Maybe less in the final round. I honestly do care more about a fair fight than an entertaing one. This isn't a carnival side show, its a legitimate sport and wins or losses greatly effect an athletes drawing power and income. Maybe a yellow card situation should come into play? Except I dont like a fighter losing his purse on the first card. Maybe losing a point if hes stalling repeatedly would be more effective than our current system. So people that are "Fitching" would lose fights for that instead of winning them. As long as referees did it correctly, I think that'd work great. You take a guy down, do nothing but hold him for 1 minute, you get stood up and warning. Do it again (any time in the fight) you get stood up and a point taken. Again, you get Dq'd. This would also apply to the guy on the bottom if he just grabbed and held on with a death grip and wouldnt advance position. Anyone like that idea? :dunno:

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Originally Posted by 3DLee (Post 1816922)

DQ for lay and pray? I love that idea. It won't work though. There is too much of a fine line between lay and pray and good grappling. Some people may be of the view that a fighter is LnP'ing while another will say hes working to a transition. Alot of the time it's subjective so for a fighter to lose a fight due to what some may regard as lay and pray is a bit unfair. I agree with St.Paul Guy, the fight should only be stood up in a closed guard position and only then. There would need to be about 15-20 seconds of nothing happening in the closed guard though. Dude on top needs a chance to get out. No need for penalties I think.

DQing wrestlers for wrestling is the worst idea ever and its nothing more than an out for one dimensional strikers.

If you can't get a guy off of you then oh well, you deserve to lose.

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Let me restate that I am against all stand ups or punishments for wrestling. But I just want a way to make it unifrom if they are going to do standups or punishments for stalling.