It is 2024, and mixed martial arts (MMA) judging is only getting worse.
UFC 307 went down last night (Sat., Oct. 5, 2024) from inside Delta Center in Salt Lake City, Utah, and boy oh boy, there were some horrendous scorecards handed out, including the co-main event between Raquel Pennington vs. Julianna Pena.
Pena scored a very controversial split decision win to reclaim the Women’s Bantamweight title from Pennington (24 out of 25 media members scored the for the former champ).
Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) CEO Dana White was not happy with the judging that occurred.
“I thought the judging tonight was atrocious,” White told the media during the UFC 307 post-fight press conference (watch here). I felt like I was at a boxing match in Ireland tonight.”
When asked again what he thought of the Mario Bautista vs. Jose Aldo judging, White doubled down.
“The judging was atrocious tonight. I’ll just leave it at that. It was atrocious.”
UFC has been around for 31 years, and somehow, it feels like judging has declined instead of improved, which is a gigantic problem. Usually, when the promotion goes to another city that doesn’t have many regional MMA events, there are generally bad regional judges because of experience. At UFC 307, Las Vegas judges (who judge almost every weekend when UFC is at the Apex) turned in the horrific scorecards.
The biggest problem of it all is … there is no cure for bad judging in sight (unless they get fired mid-card like this bozo). It will continue because there is a UFC event every single weekend, and everyone will forget about it by next weekend for UFC Vegas 98, which will have another lousy scorecard. Then, the cycle repeats and repeats and repeats.
For complete UFC 307 results, coverage, and highlights, click HERE.