Dana White not in favor of open scoring, could lead to ‘a lot of bad third rounds’

UFC President Dana White agrees to have to wait for the judges’ scores.

Over the past two years, there has been a resurgence of interest in introducing open scoring in MMA, which would allow fighters and their teams to know what scorecards look like between rounds and adjust their strategies accordingly. Invicta FC has gone so far as to introduce the concept on a few recent maps in Kansas City, Kan., With corners having a choice of whether or not they want the information.

On the one hand, knowing the score could motivate a fighter to be more aggressive in the final round if he sees that he is down against or even with his opponent; on the other hand, a fighter on the cards may decide to play as safe as possible on the last turn and deprive fans of late drama.

Speaking to the UFC on ESPN’s Laura Sanko on an ESPN + virtual question-and-answer session on Tuesday, White expressed the latter point of view.

“If a guy knows he’s done two rounds and you’re a professional fighter, you can absolutely stay away from a guy for a whole round and make the fight completely horrible,” White said (transcript via MMA Junkie). “If you already know you have two laps in the sack make sure that if you saw your score up there all (you) have to do is stay away from this guy for the next five minutes.” . That’s a lot of bad third laps.

During White’s long tenure in the UFC, he’s seen all kinds of tight calls, epic finals, and outright misses, and through it all, scoring management has always stayed the same. He has come to accept that the occasional controversy is the cost of doing business and actually sees the potential for chaos as a feature, not a bug.

“When we do the fights I have a sense of who I think won or lost or whatever, but when I’m standing there with the belt on, I don’t know what Bruce Buffer is going to say,” White said. “He doesn’t tell me anything. The judges tell him, the commission does their thing, they tell him, and I’m here waiting to hear too, so I’m just as blown away as the fans. And I agree with you: that completely takes away the anticipation of who won the fight.

Despite White’s oft-repeated saying, “Never leave this in the hands of judges,” he is content for now to maintain the status quo. White is as vocal as anyone when it comes to voicing his displeasure with a verdict, but don’t expect him to be pushing for an open scorecard anytime soon.

“It will never be perfect,” White said. “There will always be fights that will drive you completely crazy and piss you off, that will blow your bets, there will always be all these other things that go with the business of fighting.” At the end of the day, watching the fight and waiting for the results is fun.