Bloody Elbow 2014 MMA Year-End Awards: Worst Decision

It seems that Mookie is too busy being a tiny centerfielder for the Boston Red Sox and won't be able to handle the awards this time around. In his place, is...well, me. Contain your joy.

Over the next few days, Bloody Elbow is going to ask for your opinion on some of the best (and worst) things that have happened in the MMA world over the course of 2014. There will be a total of eight different categories you'll be asked to vote on, though I might change some of them up from past years. For simplicity's sake we're going to stick with high-level and relevant MMA stuff in these posts. While I'm sure there was a ludicrous knockout in an unscheduled MMA event at The Lumberyard strip club in Des Moines, or an insane pancreas lock submission on an obscure ZST! card in Japan, let's just stick to stuff a lot of us have seen, okay? (If that spiel looked familiar, it's because I've used the same one for four years in a row. Originality? What originality?)

It's pretty simple. I'll post 5-10 options in a category, you vote for what you think was the best/worst. If you think I left something really important off my list, post it in the comments and we can add it to the poll if it's deemed worthy. I can almost guarantee you won't like all my suggestions, but narrowing down these lists is tough.

I'm going off the board with this one. Every time we do these, we talk about the biggest and best of things. This time, we're going to focus on the worst - more specifically, the worst judge's decision of 2014. Judges were especially terrible of the course of the last year, screwing more fighters than the sponsorship tax and the Reebok deal combined. So, let's take a look at who the biggest bastards were!

Remember, you can still vote for Best Submission here and Biggest Upset here.

Quinton Jackson defeats Mo Lawal, Bellator 120 - It wasn't the most exciting fight despite all the hype behind it, but it did appear to most observers that Mo definitely did enough to earn two rounds. All three judges disagreed though, and Mo lost his cool after the dodgy decision.

Joanna Jedrzejczyk defeats Claudia Gadelha, UFC on Fox 13 -This one might be here due to recency bias, but whatever. Gadelha got dropped in the first but controlled the final two rounds and should have probably been awarded the decision. Instead, Jedrzejczyk eked out a split decision in a bout that will probably be best remembered for a few ill-advised shots after the final horn from both ladies.

Andrei Arlovski defeats Brendan Schaub, UFC 174 - Yes, the fight was super boring. Yes, Dana White was right that the fans are the one that lost this bout. But despite it being close, 13 of 15 media members polled had it for Schaub and five had it for him by a 30-27 score.

Will Brooks defeats Michael Chandler, Bellator 120 - Brooks stepped up on very short notice and valiantly gave Chandler everything he had over the final three rounds. There's a case for a 10-8 in there too, which led many ringside observers to believe the fight should have been scored a draw. If they weren't going to do that though, it looked like Chandler should have won a 48-47 decision by taking the fifth. Instead, Brooks walked away as the interim champ and threw Bellator into disarray for a little while.

Diego Sanchez defeats Ross Pearson, UFC Fight Night 42 - This will go down in lore as one of the worst decisions of all time, not just one of the worst this year. Nearly every single person outside of Diego's immediate family thought Pearson clearly won all three rounds. When Sanchez got his hand raised, fans and media alike just shook their heads in disgust. Jeff Collins deserves particular scorn for scoring it 30-27 Sanchez. What a joke.

Ben Henderson defeats Josh Thomson, UFC on Fox 10 - This one comes down to how you judge fights more than anything. Most saw Thomson's effective grappling to be the decider. A minority felt that Henderson's striking did enough to negate that. Either way, Henderson skirted by with a split decision win.

Sean Strickland defeats Luke Barnatt - UFC Fight Night 41 - Sure, there's a case for Strickland winning the first. But there's no way he won the second, and two judges gave him that stanza. The third was actually closer, and two judges gave that to Barnatt. So Strickland won a decision based on...well, judges not really making any sense.