I'm a pretty big fan of both the MMA and boxing. Anyway I have a rules question. I was watching a fight yesterday, and one of the fighters went for a leg take-down and missing, apparently doing this he blew his knee out, but no one knew that at the time. Anyway, since he missed the take down the other fighter had his back and was hitting him repeatedly behind the head. Now in boxing that would be the same as rabbit punching, which is illegal due to concerns about the damaging the brain stem, but this guy must have hit his opponent 10-15 times, maybe even more, on the back of the head, cause this guy was in a turtle position with the back of his head exposes. So my question, is why is this legal in MMA, (or at least the UFC) and not in boxing? Is it as dangerous as we've been lead to believe, if so, why is it allowed in the UFC?
Its not legal. Rabbit punching is illegal in almost all combat sports. What organisation was you watching?
It's illegal in mma, its just that "back of the head" is more specifically defined. Its usually taken to mean the base of the skull and the area immediately around it, John McCarthy described it as basically the back 1/4 of Liddells mohawk. The main reason would be because in boxing you have no real legal reason to be throwing punches when the guy has his back to you, whereas it is legal and fairly common to be doing so in MMA, like in the situation you described.
It was UFC fight, don't remember the fighters names except that it was on SPIKE tv after a Leben - Martin fight. I watched it yesterday, but it was taped. But the guy who won, was definately raining punches on to the base of the guys neck, where the neck and head are joined, and nobody said anything about it, and the ref was in close proximity.
Saw the fight. It was Kenny Florian and Din Thomas. He should have gotten a verbal warning, but I think the ref was trying to see if Din was going to do anything.
Yup that was the fight, but it sure seemed to me like punches were landing on the back of Thomas' neck and no one seemed to care. The ref didn't say anything, neither did the commentators, nor the two fighters for that matter. Yet, I'm pretty sure those were punches to the back of the head near the neck area.