Wednesday, August 19, 2009

Nevada Now Allows Limited 5-Round Non-Title Bouts in MMA

The Nevada State Athletic Commission held a regulatory meeting on Wednesday, which often consists of lots of little tweaks to the regulations and/or their wording. But this time, there were a few notable exceptions.

One of the biggest bits of news to come out of the meeting was the institution of instant replay in limited situations in a mixed martial arts bout. The gist of the new rule basically says that if a fight ends on an injury to one combatant, the referee has the leeway, if it is available, to look at a replay of the fight ending action and determine if the action was legal, resulting in a TKO victory, or illegal, resulting in a no contest.

The other major provision coming out of the meeting was, hopefully, an end to the UFC 94 "greasegate" issue arising over UFC welterweight champion Georges St. Pierre's improper usage of Vaseline during the bout. The new rule, dubbed "The B.J. Penn Rule," now prohibits a fighter or his camp from utilizing any foreign substance immediately before or during a bout to gain an unfair advantage.

Commission representatives, such as cut men, are still allowed to apply Vaseline or other substances before or during a fight to try and limit the amount of damage due to cuts, but it is now considered a foul if a fighter or his corner applies any foreign substance.

The commission also passed a regulation that allows for five-round non-title bouts in MMA between two athletes, “as long as, of course, they are of championship caliber,” according to Executive Director Keith Kizer.

The move to allow non-title bouts to go to a five-round duration basically puts MMA on par with boxing in such regards. There are often marquee non-title bouts in boxing, such as the upcoming Floyd Mayweather, Jr. vs. Juan Manuel Márquez, that are scheduled for the same 12-round duration as a title bout.

This opens things up for promotions such as the UFC to have marquee bouts on a fight card that are not-title bouts, such as the recent UFC 99 bout between Rich Franklin and Wanderlei Silva, but still have them go five full rounds.

11 comments:

Slippery Slope said...

Thank You Nevada and Kieth Kizer for once again raping a sport and shattering the legitamacy of a Championship bout, Just like in boxing, Title bouts are now worthless in prestige. GOD You people are fucking worthless!!! STAY OUT OF OUR FUCKING SPORT!!!!!!!!!!

Chunk Monk said...

Disagree with the first post. Five round fights are great for the sport. Iceman vs Silva made a great case for a five round fight. It was two evenly matched opponents in a "fight of the decade" scenario.

If they were going to make every fight a five rounder than I would take issue... Hell, Arlovski vs. Sylvia for the title never should have been five rounders. Snooze!

Anonymous said...

If Liddell vs. Silva was "Fight of the Decade"... then there would have been a title on the line, both were far past thier prime. Just because two guys have popular names shouldnt give them the distinction and honor of going 5 rounds. 25 min. is symbolic of reaching the top of the mountain. NOW it means nothing.

DeltaSigChi4 said...

Yeah, because some main events or co-main events on pay-per-view are twenty-five minute fights as opposed to only papertitle fights, then 25min means nothing. Slippery Slop and Anonymousdouche are some of the stupidest people to ever post comments on this blog section.

"Just like in boxing"?

MMA wishes it had an iota of the prestige of boxing. When was the last time Ken Burns made a documentary on MMA?

E

Anonymous said...

Delta, when was the last time anyone cared what Ken Burns thinks? Boxing is in tatters and you damn well know that, it's such a pathetically corrupt sport that is on the decline and is hanging on Mayweather/Pacquiao's interests, and that fight is still a long time away, sorry but Burns is not the spokesperson for contact sports, nor should he be considered the final word for boxing either.

5 rounds is fine for "special" main event, it's no different then boxing has for special attractions, Hendo/Franklin should have been 5 rounds, it will cut down on the bogus split decisions and give a more concise winner and it's ONLY for special fights.

Stay out of our sport? This helps it you morons, it'll give a much better fight, how can anyone argue against that? A title is a title regardless of how long it is, how many title shots have we seen for 5 rounds that are complete snoozefests?

You guys will whine about anything, this just gives potential dream fights that much more of a stage. Could you really imagine GSP/Silva being only 3 rounds?

Chunk Monk said...

There are too many great fighters out there right now to say only championship fights should be able to go five rounds.

I stand behind my Liddell vs. Silva comment. They both reached the top of the mountain in UFC and Pride but never fought each other in their prime. Their three round fight left questions in my mind who would have won a championship type war between the two. It was a special fight and deserved two extra rounds.

Anonymous said...

Slippery = Braindead.

YOU get out of our sport.

Anonymous said...

Why would u want a fight to go to the judge's scorecard when u could see two more rounds. Every main event should be 5 rounds. We pay money to see fights finished. Not to see them ended too early.

jjmdirector said...

I think this is a great idea. with 5 rounds it will absolutely cut down on decisions. I think they would use this for lw,ww,mw, fighters more than heavyweights. I definitely don't wanna see 2 heavies that are wrestlers roll around for 5 rounds so matchmaking will be very important too.

Anonymous said...

Just because the NSAC now allows for five round marquee match ups doesn't mean the UFC has to utilize this rule. Dana could very well decide he likes things the way they are and leave 5 rounders for title fights

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