The judging in MMA has been a constant source of controversy in the past year, and complaints have ranged from the fans to the Dana White.
You can add George Roop to that list as well.
Roop lost a controversial split decision fight to Japanese star Hatsu Hioki this past weekend at UFC 137, and Roop wasn’t very thrilled with the decision.
“First of all, if your looking at the whole fight altogether, I won the fight,” Roop told me. “That’s obvious I won the fight. Now the question is, did I win the rounds? How did the judges score these rounds? Obviously I won the fight. I damaged him and he was happy that the fight was over. It really came down to that first round. I already knew he won the second round. I already knew I won the third round. It really came down to that first round. It was a close round, but I won the first round. I hit him with more strikes standing up. I did take the standup for about two minutes. We jockeyed for position along the cage for about another couple minutes and he hit a takedown. I scrambled back up right away. I was down for maybe 15 seconds, something like that. I finished the round pretty strong, so I feel like I definitely won the first round. I’d give myself a 10-9 on that.”
Roop feels that judges need to look at the round as a whole and not base the round on one takedown.
“I’m not opposed to scoring takedowns because it is apart of mixed martial arts. Takedowns definitely score points. When your talking about the output, I had a lot more output then he had standing up. I landed many more strikes. I feel like that one takedown negated everything I did.”
Was Roop surprised by anything Hioki did during the fight?
“No, not at all. I knew what Hioki was going to do before he even knew what he was going to do.”
Since the fight ended on Saturday the fans have been outpouring on Twitter and Facebook in there support for Roop.
“Excellent support, I have a really good following. Everybody is real positive. It’s good to get positive feedback.”
Even after a close loss against a guy who is ranked high in the featherweight division, Roop feels his stock rose after the fight.
“I don’t know where I am ranked in the MMA polls. I believe I am a top ten fighter. I think I really proved that. It doesn’t show on my record unfortunately. You look at the guys I fight. I have really took it to some top level guys. I know that was a loss on my record against Hioki, but I feel I won that fight.”
You can listen to the entire interview with Roop here.
You can follow me on Twitter @fightclubchi
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