Judging inconsistencies are STILL a problem in this sport.

If you are looking for an article that is going to be about how Diaz should have won, you may as well just press that little x in the top right corner. I had the fight 2-2 and no idea how to score the 3rd round, which was the deciding round in my mind. I had the ability to immediately re-watch this fight after it happened. I wanted to break it down and go round by round after two of the judges (including Cecil Peoples) had the fight 4-1 for Carlos. Round 1 and 4 were obviously Condit. I gave 2 and 5 to Nick. That being said, once the judges scorecards came out my jaw hit the floor. How did two judges score that 5th round for Condit?

When I see two guys striking, for someone to get a clear advantage they have to do some damage. Condit had two clean flurries in the round, the first of which ended with a clean high kick...but Nick walked right through it and landed some nice shots of his own. Had that shot rocked Diaz, I could see how Condit gets the round, but it didn't. Nick remained in the centre of the octagon and pressed forward through both of those flurries, and with a 1:20 left on the clock secured the back, took him down, and started working for submissions. It wasn't like Diaz hit a lazy single, and stalled in his Condit's guard....he took his freakin' back! It's probably the second most dominant position on the ground, and the judges didn't award Diaz for it. We've seen fights where guys literally take someone down and stall in the guard and get a 30-27 UD, but Diaz is able to take and hold Condit's back for over a minute and still loses the round? That's BS. Either make dominant positions worth the round or don't, but there has to be some consistency with how judges hand out points.

I'm not mad Condit won, he fought an intelligent fight and did what he had to do to win. I am, however, a little concerned with how the judges viewed the fight overall as there is no way that Condit won the 5th round if you are judging by the UFC rulebook. Dana always says "Don't leave it in the hands of the judges", which sums up the problem perfectly. If a promoter and his fighter don't have faith that the official judges are competent enough to award a proper decision, I don't know how people like Keith Kizer do. Judges have to stop being subjective and start being consistent.