Ok so we were all pissed off with the Lara - Williams decision the weekend. How any judge could have scored it a draw is beyond me, let alone have it in Paul's favour. It's not as if it's the first time. Just a few weeks ago we have Devon Alexander gifted a decision against Mattysse. Then we have high profile bull**** decisions like Lewis - Holyfield 1. The list is endless. So, what can be done to improve this faulty system? Would it be a better idea to have 5 judges instead of 3. That way, if 1 judge is grossly out of line with the scores (Sturm winning by 4 rounds against Macklin for instance), they would be overruled by the others? Or would it be better for the judges to be scrapped altogether in favour of a CompuBox-type system, with the fighter who lands most punches in the round be awarded the round? But this would be a problem as 'classier' work would not be awarded. Say for instance Fighter X outlands Fighter Y by 5 punches, but Fighter Y landed high quality punches rather than a plodding jab. Quality punches wouldn't therefore be awarded. Would an Olympic style system be better, with whoever lands the most punches in the entire fight wins the bout outright, regardless of rounds. Should judges be scrapped in favour of Sport Journalist opinion at ringside as these would be less open to corruption? Of these four ideas, I'd favour the 5 judge system, but it's still a system which could be open to 'misinterpretation' (ie we could still see bull**** decisions awarded). But more judges would mean an individual scorecard would be 'less powerful', and the scorecards that are way off the mark will be overruled by the others. I also think judges should be made to justify EVERY fight they score, not just controversial ones. Any other thoughts?
15 or 20 round championship fights were the challenger has to stop the champ to take his title....old school
Any sport where the winner can be decided by people making subjective decisions is always going have controversial outcomes. It's fair enough that some judges have different opinions to others, but I think in boxing a lot of the obviously bad verdicts are the result of blatant corruption. I don't think any kind of punch counting system would help matters, boxers would simply box to satisfy the system, rather than actually fight (like they do in the amatures). Also, I don't think judges are particularly good at determining when a punch lands or not, let alone whether it was hard enough to count. Plus, it's still open to abuse. Open scoring, where the scores are shown after every 4 rounds could be one way to go, but I fear it would change the way fighters box too much. Also, still open to abuse. Unfortunately, as long as people can be corrupted, (or at least make mistakes) we are stuck with bad decisions in boxing. Even if somebody came up with a fair and virtually infallable system of scoring fights, you can bet that a brown envelope full of money will ensure it never happens.
How about havinh 10 judges say its 6 judges score it 10-9 and the other 4 9-10 it would be a 10-9 round to the first fighter?
For me there should be 5 judges all sat seperatly around the ring, they each must all send there scores for each round individually by computer with a brief reason why they scored it to the given fighter. That would be a more concise and accurate way of judging imho.
Having more judges seem like a good idea, how about an interactive thing on tv, like "Push the red button to vote now". More judges would simply mean more people to "look after". It would be too expensive...
My suggestion would be that commissions fine/take disciplinary action against grossly incompetent judges. They do it for fighters, they should do it for the people scoring the bout too. Of course, the main problem is that the commissions are as corrupt as the officials judging the fight, so it'd never work.
That's a good idea. Have a point system for judges, and the ones who are the worst get relegated from the bigger fights. The ones who consistently perform the best get to officiate the big title fights. But I suppose this only pushes the problem further down the line
Very good idea having the judges sit away from each other. Why this ist being done I don't no. They def should have to justify each round the scored, but I'd say do that at the end of the fight rather than during it.
They would be less inclined to be influenced by the other two around them. Or was that :huh emotion because they already sit away from each other?