Placing MMA judging under the microscope after each UFC event, The Couchside Judges examine all the rounds fight fans are debating at home. Hopefully, you’ll learn a thing or two along the way.
Episodes
Tuesday Feb 14, 2023
Tuesday Feb 14, 2023
Dan can't get enough of Makhachev vs. Volkanovski, so the CSJ have plenty to say about the scoring of a close champion vs. champion battle. Scott also enlisted the help of an actual judge (whom shall remain anonymous) to give thoughts on a decision which left some — including Dan, at first — scratching their heads.
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Tuesday Feb 07, 2023
Tuesday Feb 07, 2023
Fedor's farewell took up a lot of the oxygen in a two-event battle between Bellator and UFC, but nothing got Dan more emotional than the frustration of super-late UFC fights between sub-standard UFC fighters. Predictably, it was those fights which produced half of the Contested Rounds of this show. Come for the judging talk, stay for Dan's rage.
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Monday Jan 30, 2023
Monday Jan 30, 2023
The UFC ventures Down Under in February for the first time since 2019, meaning The Couchside Judges haven't had many opportunities to bring up the local cageside officials. Scott touched upon some data regarding officials from that region of the globe. But numbers can't tell the whole story, so he and Dan do their due diligence by watching a ton of rounds scored by some of the officials who might be staffing UFC 284 and see how their scores stack up in a unique, lookback edition of Contested Rounds.
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Monday Jan 23, 2023
Monday Jan 23, 2023
The Couchside Judges give a warm welcome to Aaron Bronsteter, their fellow graduate of the 2022 ABC Conference's MMA judging training course (and the refereeing course, too) who joins in on all the Contested Rounds conversation. And with very little disagreement among the judges in Brazil, the bulk of the post-UFC 283 edition focuses on 10-8s vs. 10-9s.
Plus, Scott and Dan debut a new segment examining unanimous 10-8s for potential 10-7 consideration. Did either of the two from Saturday in Rio make the grade? Listen and find out.
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Monday Jan 16, 2023
Monday Jan 16, 2023
UFC live events are back, which means Scott and Dan dive back into Contested Rounds. Blessedly, one event is in the books without major judging uproar despite the occurrence the quirkiest of split decisions — the kind Scott has dubbed "alternative decisions." CSJ dives into that and more, so give it a listen.
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Monday Jan 09, 2023
Monday Jan 09, 2023
The 10-7 round is MMA's giant squid; it exists, but good luck ever spotting one live. To the knowledge of Scott and Dan, no unanimous 10-7 rounds have ever happened, and they're hyper rare to even have one judge pull a 7. But, at least in the UFC since the scoring criteria was modified in 2016, there have been 5 known 10-7s.
The CSJ examine those rounds, plus a handful of unanimous 10-8s in recent years, to see how they would score them based on the way they were taught at the ABC training course in summer 2022. Ever wonder why these rounds are so rare? Listen and learn.