Grade Steve Willis' performance as a ref tonight.

F - Atrocious

Regularly late on end of round bell to break the action
Late on getting inbetween Lemeuix and GGG after the knockdown
Asking Lemeiux "show me something" when he was just going defensive for a few minutes, needlessly putting pressure on him
Needlessly stopping the action and calling the doctor in over a bloody nose
Horrible stoppage misread due to Lemeuix being indecisive over going down or not after being hurt with a body shot.

That about covers it?

 

he also got in the way of the fighters more then a few times and prevented lemi from moving. i was happy with the stoppage, lemi took that body shot an looked over at the ref, he wanted out

 

Thats where I differ about this I think he was in two minds about going down and taking a knee and staying up and gutting it out. When you want to take a knee it often happens that you make eye contact with the ref to let him know you are doing it. It sent the wrong signal but the ref should have been wise to that fact. Ultimately I still blame the ref.

 

Horrible, absurd stoppage.

 

In any other fight it's a good stoppage. But this is a PPV, unification, life-changing fight. If he was that concerned he should left it until the end of the round and let his corner know he was giving him one last round to show something.

 

Terrible. . Should never be allowed to ref a big fight again. .. making stupid faces, too close to the fighters, calling in doctors, forcing Lemieux hand by going in he corner and telling him he needs to show him something. . Should have given more time for the hit while down, even though unintentionally. .

 

Very negative referee, vgetting in the way,the bloody nose incid4ent, the ref standing right next to lemi from round 5 waiting to jump in at any given time. Championship fight, give them benefit of the doubt, so what if he winced, fighters take these shots, wince and comeback. Good job he never reffed Corrales and castillo. GGG put on a performance btw and was stuck in 1st gear, but he is too easy to hit and I look forward to the day he fights the better fighters of the division.

 

This was definitely the worst thing on the night, refs are supposed to be professional at all times like the fighters, instead he was getting in the way of lemi, almost like a sycophant ***** looking him in the eye, saying i feel your pain im going to get you out of this mess. The negative energy that would give a fighter is enormous.

 

Colon was fresh in his mind so he had to be cautious

 

he was better than that Cellstino Ruiz guy from Chicago who fukked up the Szpilka Mollo 1 fight and the Kona Kameda fight.

But, I agree......in big fights like these, you need someone like Smoger, Nady, Bayless, etc.

Someone who can better read a fighters body language.

FTR....the Viloria stoppage was worse.

But both seemed premature.

Vilora had just taken every breathe of air from Roman 30 seconds prior to his L and had to survive only 13 more seconds.

Lemiuex had what, 30 seconds to survive.

When your'e that close to the end of a rd, a standing 8 is more than appropriate.:think

 

he did a good job. lemieux was taking a beating. why continue taking punishment?

 

Terrible. When Golovkin hit Lemieux when he was down, he should have stopped the action, warned Golovkin or even deducted a point (maybe, because Golovkin didn't do it with malice), and given Lemieux time to recover.

Lemieux has an iron chin, but that shot could have seriously ended the fight for most other middles. So it wasn't a thing to let go only because it didn't hae effect.

Also the stoppage was bull****. Lemieux just wanted to take another knee, it would have only been his second one, nothing wrong with that. But he knew the referee wanted to stop the fight, so he tried to stay upright.

He could have went easily other rounds, as a champion he deserved to defend his belt better.

 

Exactly. He was getting a terrible beating round after round, punching thin air most of the time too. I didn't see lemieux or his corner bitterly contesting the stoppage either. The ref did exactly the right thing. It's easy for *****s sitting behind a keyboard to say the opposite though..

 

The punch GGG did while Lemiux was worthy of point deduction and Lemiux did not show any sign of quitting/being in serius danger of getting hurt at the moment of stoppage. I think he was looking at referee,because he was actually worried about the referee jumping in and stopping the fight. Lemiux recovered very well from the earlier, more hurtful body punch. 2 serious mistakes in a title fight should be enough to keep this guy out of refereeing any important fights for a good while.