Do any other sports do this? If the rules don’t supply enough action you change the rules… You dont just give refs power to arbitrarily penalize fighters with very loose criteria.
To add to this, wasn’t he going into the “work” schtick almost immediately after the takedown? There’s a reason “position over submission” is a saying in MMA. It’s not ideal or entertaining to watch a guy get laid on for an entire round, but you have to give the fighters time to work in/out of grappling scenarios.
This recent movement to speed grappling exchanges along is essentially forcing scrambles or accepting a standup or separation.
2 Likes
I liked Yuji allowing them to have near-death experiences.
But the yellowcards, no.
Isn’t there a rule against timidity, or something like that? I’ll search and see what I can find.
Edit, I’m wrong. Timidity is in the rules, but it’s defined as running away, not lay and pray.
- Timidity (avoiding contact, or consistently dropping the mouthpiece, or faking an injury:
Timidity is defined as any fighter who purposely avoids contact with his opponent, or runs away
from the action of the fight. Timidity can also be called by the referee for any attempt by a fighter
to receive time by falsely claiming a foul, injury, or purposely dropping or spitting out their
mouthpiece or other action designed to stall or delay the action of the fight
1 Like
Thats my point though… Like in another sport… they would make a defined rule like shot clock or an off side rule or something to try and control pacing kind of thing.
If they had a position clock (not saying this is the solution just an example) or something that would be better then leaving it up to the ref to decide.
Baseball did it where the pitcher cant keep checking the base runners over and over in between the pitches, number of meetings on the mound, etc.
1 Like
I agree it’s all arbitrary, but I also don’t want to watch a guy lay in someone’s guard for 5 minutes pitter pattering tiny little shots to the side then win by ‘control.’