Kaitlin Young Weighs-In

"My left cheek and area surrounding the eye are looking pretty ugly today, but there was no major damage. Though it may have looked like it on tv, I never actually had an open wound. What you didn’t see was that the doctor actually cleared me to fight the third round but the commission said ‘no.’ I wanted to continue, my corner wanted to continue. The cut likely would have opened in the third but it was under the eye. If I had to guess, I would say that they didn’t want the visual of a woman with a bloody face on CBS. They also chose not to do a post fight interview with me or to include me in the post fight news conference and after party. I think the reason for that was my beat up appearance after the fight because I was not seriously injured and was completely coherent. I am very disappointed about that but cant help but wonder how people would have responded to that, as stupid as it is." 

via www.fightergirls.com 

I feel bad for Kaitlin after hearing her side of the story, but could she have really expected a different outcome? Both these girls had to have known that it would look very bad for CBS and Elite XC for them to have been involved in a fight that left either of the fighters looking completely beat-up. Yes, this is MMA and yes, this does happen; Most of the general public is just not used to seeing this happen to women.

On the other hand I believe Kaitlin's opinion to be a bit misguided when she states that CBS did not want "the visual of a woman with a bloody face" on national television. While I believe this is the case, I think it goes deeper than this. The fact is that CBS did not want anyone on that card with a bloody face or to continue fighting with any visual injuries. There were many premature stoppages and many fights that were stopped by one party or another. 

It's also interesting to hear that she was not granted access to the post-fight press conference. Sometimes only the winners attend these, but Phil Baroni was in attendance and he was unsuccessful in his bout. It is clear that not only did Elite XC protect it's 'stars', but that it did it's best to protect the notion that MMA is a safe sport and that no one gets hurt. It seemed that everyone who participated in the post-fight press conference was pretty much unscathed. Wouldn't it have been great if Kaitlin Young had the attitude of a Tito Ortiz?

It is interesting to hear Kaitlin's side of the story and to hear her call it how it is. One simply has to step back and realize that no matter how much we as fans believe we were robbed on Saturday night, many of the fighters were robbed even more. This is their livelihood we are talking about here, not just something they like to do on Saturday nights.