Coined as the most controversial fight of the year by many MMA fans, Michael Bisping vs. Matt Hamill in their light heavyweight clash was one of the closest fights the UFC has seen in quite some time. Matt Hamill, the deaf NCAA championship wrestler, came out with an unorthodox style in that he outboxed Bisping in the 1st round and surprised everyone with his incredibly improved standup. Bisping didn't let that stop him from working his own boxing routine in the 2nd round and 3rd rounds. When it came down to the final decision, Michael Bisping came out on top via a split decision that rocked the MMA world, at least for this weekend. As the scores were read, fans were in disbelief, even the UK faithful to Bisping. Cecil Peoples scored it 30-27 Matt Hamill. Chris Watts and Jeff Mullen scored it 29-28 Michael Bisping to help him secure a win, but certainly didn't convince the fans watching that he was ready for the mid-tier fighters of the division or even Matt Hamill. It made many fans ask the tough question, was this fight rigged? Did Chris Watts and Jeff Mullen see the same fight we did? Is there any evidence to back any of this up? Did the fans of MMA really get robbed? Let's find out.

Overall Fight Breakdown

To be fair in this assessment, Matt Hamill clearly won the first round. He came out with energy and clearly had better boxing in the first round. He was able to land more punches and it was clear he caused more damage to Bisping. Let's unanimously state Matt Hamill won the first round. The third round could be argued for as well, but the majority of the MMA community felt Bisping did pull out the stops in the third round. Hamill was fairly gassed, and Bisping took advantage. That leaves us with the controversial second round scoring. What happened in the second round that really split the community of fans?

The breakdown that I've managed to put together is much like boxing. I broke down the standup because since the round composed of mostly a boxing match, the striking aspect of the fight will have more bearing on the round score. Since Jeff Mullen was one of the referees in the bout, I will reference an interview he did awhile back regarding the Clay Guida vs. Tyson Griffin bout. I respect Jeff Mullen, but I think he made a mistake in this matchup. I'm not going to sit here and tell everyone to hate him. It's his job, and mistakes happen, but for sake of comparing thoughts and to determine a standard for the judging of these fights, I will reference some quotes:

"There's a lot of things you look at," says Mullen. "The things you look at are effective striking, effective grappling, Octagon (ring) control, effective aggression and effective defence. "But the most important by far are effective striking and effective grappling." Judges must adapt to the fight before them, says Mullen. "If 80 per cent of the round is spent standing up, then effective striking is going to carry a whole lot more weight than effective grappling. Whereas say 95 per cent of the fight was fought on the ground, then effective grappling would count more than the effective striking. So it's a sliding scale and you have to adjust it to where most of the fight takes place." ¹

I agree with this statement. If the fight takes place on the feet for 80 percent of the round, obviously the standup will have more bearing on the scorecard. Also note that Octagon control, effective aggression, and effective defense are key points for the judges to pay attention to as well.

From watching the second round with utter scrutiny, this breakdown is fairly accurate. It is safe to say though that the standup was rather even. Yes, Bisping did have some very good dodgy tactics and good counter punching, but Hamill also was able to land some pretty decent blows in the clinch. Here's Mullen's explanation:

Watch the beginning of the second round closely. When Hamill throws the jab, Bisping slips the punch and hits him with his own counter jab. It is hard to see on camera because Hamill's back is to the camera. His back was also to Goldie who was talking like the beginning of this round was like a continuation of the 1st. If you look you will see that Hamill is facing me giving me a clear view of what is landing. Bisping was landing the jab again and again and not getting hit. Hamill got 2 takedowns in rounds 2 and 3 but did very little with them. Bisping is using an active guard trying to turn for armbars and sweeps, Hamill is doing very little on top. Bisping is keeping him from scoring or improving his position.²

The beginning of this statement is very true, except for the fact that it isn't stated really how many times Bisping kept landing "the jab again and again.". In that first 2 minutes, Bisping didn't land a horrendous amount of jabs nor did he land a lot of his combinations. To be perfectly honest, I found it amazing that Hamill was covering up, and Bisping was still punching into Hamill's forearms. He didn't pick his spots. Later in the round, Bisping landed a few choice jabs by actually pinpointing his shots. He did none of this in the first 2 minutes. I really fail to see where he really landed a lot of jabs consecutively. Late in the round, many fans have tried to make a case, but Hamill blocked a majority of Bisping's total thrown punches in the last minute of the fight. Bisping landed 3-4 solid punches, but have about 8-10 good punches blocked with ease. This was also the case in in the beginning of the match. I felt that Hamill blocked and defended himself against a lot of counters and jabs that judges must have counted in order to really give Bisping a bigger edge.

That brings me to my second point, Octagon control and aggression. As stated in the first quote from Jeff Mullen, Octagon Control, effective aggression, and effective defense are also taken into consideration. The defense point could be made, but Bisping made very good transitions from the ground to his feet to get out of the takedowns. Both fighters were even in defense. Hamill defended many of Bisping's strikes, and Bisping defended himself during the takedowns very well. Octagon control and aggression, however, should have been enough to give Hamill the round. He not only pushed the pace during the 2nd round, but he stalked Bisping around the ring. He also took down Bisping with next to no force. Bisping ate the takedown, and yet Hamill received no praise due to the fact he didn't engage on the ground. Fact is, he aggressively took Bisping down, and Bisping did nothing to stop it. Bisping popped up from the 2nd takedown, but the first one he was effectively trying to limit Hamill. Note, he was "trying to limit" Hamill. The rubber guard is great for setting up all sorts of submission attempts and body control techniques, but Bisping wasn't trying anything except for surviving. Hamill broke it, and still rattled off a few choice punches. Also, Hamill did land some decent uppercuts during the transition from ground to feet on Bisping that also seemed to not count in his overall performance.

This is my formal opinion of the fight, but I will say that I can see why Jeff Mullen scored it the way he did. He did make a post about it that is quoted above, but after watching it many times, I can see where people could feel Bisping won the fight due to effective boxing. I still feel Hamill's aggression and takedowns, along with the fact he was dictating the pace should have went far enough to edge the round in his favor.

Judges' Calls

This isn't the first time we have seen something like this occur, and it won't be the last. If anyone recalls the controversial Clay Guida vs. Tyson Griffin battle, Mullen was also a part of that fight as well except he was the man who went against the grain and ruled the fight in favor of Clay Guida. The MMA community also felt Guida won, but the two judges scoring the bout with Mullen felt Tyson Griffin won the battle. We can't all sit here blaming someone like Mullen for this fight's outcome. Although many disagree with his judgement on this bout, look at the fight more closely and honestly look at Bisping's boxing in the second round. It's much closer than people originally thought.

Cecil Peoples also had pretty much the same explanation as Mullen.³  He did state that he thought Bisping was more aggressive, but I still stand firm on the point that Hamill did push Bisping around the ring and did push the pace more than Bisping did. Hamill also landed some nice punches near the end during the last flurry, while Bisping had nearly all of his combos blocked in the middle of the fight, some toward the end. Peoples is also no man to shy away from a controversial fight. He judged the controversial Griffin vs. Ortiz battle. Overall, judging in MMA is obviously a tough as hell job to do. I think a very good solution would be to have MMA specific judges that are either re-trained from being boxing judges or must prove their judging is bar none unflawed. I realize that's a huge feat, but it seems that the other aspects besides effective grappling and striking are being discounted even though they are always stated to be a part of the official scoring.

Hook, Line, and Sinker

I'm with the MMA community on this battle. Matt Hamill won the fight. The one thing that I do disagree with is that the fight was a blowout win for Hamill. It was by far one of the closest battles of this year. When you watch this fight over and over during the second round, it is honestly very tough not to give the standup to Bisping based on better strikes. I believe Hamill landed a tad more, but essentially made it an even landed vs. thrown punches on the feet. In my analysis, I think Hamill's aggression and Octagon control was overlooked just because he didn't do much with his takedown. Mullen even admits in his Metronews interview about the Guida fight that takedowns that stun opponents count for more, but even basic takedowns account for Octagon control.⁴ I think this was overlooked and ultimately sunk Hamill's chances for being awarded that second round.

With the outcry of the decisions, Dana White already making comments about how bad judging wouldn't be a factor if the fighters had finished it before the end of three rounds⁵, and the ultimate idea of a rematch, this issue isn't going to be dying soon. But maybe, just maybe something will come of this from a judging standpoint. More trainings, more tape reviews, more.. something to better the judging of these events. I will say one thing, I may not agree with the decision, but the decision ultimately brought the beast out of Michael Bisping into the public eye.⁶