The UFC is planning on making a formal request to the Association of Boxing Commissions, which helps oversee athletic commissions in North America, as well as the maintenance of the Unified Rules of Mixed Martial Arts, which is used universally by North American commissions, in order to examine and change how accidental eyepokes are dealt with.
What spurred this were the controversial events at Saturday’s UFC 159, which included light-heavyweight Gian Villante losing by technical decision to fellow Strikeforce veteran Ovince St. Preux after referee Kevin Mulhall halted the action 33 seconds into the third round following an accidental eyepoke.
Mere seconds after the eyepoke occurred, Mulhall asked Villante if he could see and Villante, because he was just poked in the eye, responded “no” and the fight was immediately stopped. At that point, the fight went to the judges, who had to give a score for the partial third round, and the scores were 30-28, 30-29 and 29-29 for a majority technical decision.
Afterwards, Villante said he felt he should have been given some time to recover because he would have been able to continue.
“Now obviously, if any fighter can’t see, you want the fight stopped,” the UFC’s vice-president of regulatory affairs Marc Ratner told MMAjunkie.com. “But here’s a case where if you go through the mechanics and bring the doctor in, it will give them a chance to see if in fact the eye clears up and he can fight. That’s what you want to do there.
“The referee was a very good referee. Kevin Mulhall is one of the top referees in the world. Once the fighter said he couldn’t see, it puts the referee in a position where he has to stop it. So it’s the kind of thing where you want the doctors, who are there for that exact reason, to make the final determination before you stop the fight.”
The Unified Rules of MMA states for a fighter who is not fouled by low blow (shot to the groin) but another foul: “If a contest or exhibition of mixed martial arts is stopped because of an accidental foul, the referee shall determine whether the unarmed combatant who has been fouled can continue or not.”
Whereas if a fighter is hit with a low blow, the Unified Rules say they have up to five minutes to recover and “if the fighter states that they can continue on before the five minutes of time have expired, the referee shall as soon as practical restart the fight.”
Ratner didn’t suggest that the eyepoke rule needed to be identical to the five-minute low blow recovery time, though, just that a doctor should be brought into the cage before a decision to stop the fight is made.
“What we want the referees to do is don’t make a medical decision,” Ratner explained. “Call time. Don’t ask the kid if he can see or not. Bring the doctor in and let the doctor make the determination.”
“I think by bringing the doctor in, just the whole operation will take a couple of minutes, and I think that should alleviate most of the pain and give us enough time to make sure the guy can fight,” Ratner said.
UFC president Dana White told MMAJunkie.com: “What needs to happen is the (Association of Boxing Commissions) needs to get together, and we need to come up with a few things … We really do need to revamp some rules and (regulations). I think obviously the eyepoke thing is a big deal. We need to talk about that.”
