Where do I start? I guess Chicago since the scores were so different. Prior to Chicago the judges were under the “Chowdhry”, (previous corrupt AIBA President) scoring criteria. It was a way to evaluate the judges based on 5 criteria. When the judges do a bout, at the end, they will have two scores. One is their total score which is how many times they pushed red and blue buttons for each boxer and the other is the accepted score which is how many times at least 2 other judges pushed the same color button in the 1 second window. One of the criteria’s under the Chowdhry system was that your total score could be 3 times higher than your accepted score. If your total score was lower than the final accepted score for the bout, you got a warning. If you were over 3 times higher, you got a caution so judges would pad their scores in the last round for the boxer that was winning so they would not have a total score lower than the accepted and they were not on a 4-1 which also got you a warning. It is usually easy to tell who is winning the last round by who is doing the most running away.
When we got to Chicago, we were told there was new criteria for the judges and that there were 3 instead of 5. The 1st one is your average of the accepted to your total score. If your accepted score to your total score was under 50%, caution, under 40%, warning. I thought great, now we can just count real scoring blows and not just play piano on the key pad. No more 3 times higher scores for mostly BS punches. The 2nd criteria is your averages to the other 4 judges. Though the judges may all have the same winner, if your score is much higher or lower than the other judges, you can get cautions or warnings depending on the averages. The last criteria is if you get a 4-1 which is a warning unless your accepted score is only different by 3 or less.
I have no problem if the scores are high but when you really push for a punch that landed unblocked and you actually saw it and not just thought it landed, ie, his back is to you and the other boxer throws a punch and you see his head go back, you think it may have landed but did he have his hands up and actually block it but the power of the punch made his head go back or he moved his head back to not get hit. In amateur boxing, the judges are only supposed to score what they really see land, unblocked with the knuckles of the glove not the inside palm of the glove. When judges actually only score what is legal, the score will be lower like in the Olympics, though they should have been higher if the judges scored the jabs and body punches. Yes, I know that is different from pro boxing where you can take different things into account like power, aggressiveness, defense, etc. I don’t necessary agree with just scoring landed unblocked blows but that is the amateur rules.
In Chicago, they told us the new criteria but it was only said in English! Usually at these meetings, everything is translated into Russian, Spanish, French and sometimes Arabic or German. So basically in Chicago, the judges scored under the old criteria and had their total scores 3 times higher than their accepted scores because they did not understand what was said to them.
In Beijing, before each session, we would have a R/J meeting lead by Terry Smith from Wales, the head of the R/J commission. Usually Ho Kim who is the Executive Director of AIBA was also there with Rudy Obreja and sometimes CK Wu, the President of AIBA would come and talk to us. On the 1st day, Smith said; beware of 2 syndromes, the host country syndrome and the strong boxing nation syndrome. What he meant was that usually host countries always get some gift scoring and with strong boxing countries like Russia and Cuba, judge’s sometimes assume they will win and often are extra generous to them when they may not deserve it. He told us to score what you see and score jabs and body shots if they meet the criteria of a scoring blow and to not just score the power punches.
You all saw what happened. He was correct about the 2 syndromes and it happened like it always does and the judges did not do as he said in regards to scoring jabs and body shots. Well I should say most did not score what should have been scored. Let me explain why I think that happened.
If you were judging a bout that did not have a Chinese boxer, the crowd would cheer for each boxer when the score went up on the screen so you as a judge got instant verification if the point you just scored was scored by at least 2 other judges. Many times, myself and other judges I was friends with said we would be scoring good punches and no crowd reaction and you’re thinking to yourself, these dummies are not scoring body shots or jabs. It made judges leery to keep scoring them because you would get warned for being higher than the other judges on your total score because the final score were so low. It was very frustrating because we were being told to score ALL scoring blows but for some reason, many were not. They were protecting themselves. Most of the R/J’s are former boxers. Just like boxers, they want to get to the finals. The way to get to the finals is to finish high in the evaluation that is computed based on your judging according to the 3 criteria mentioned above. At the end of each session, the computer spits out an evaluation and ranks the judges 1-34 based on their scoring. The ones at the bottom get cut first.
I feel in general, they got the right winner but hurt the boxers who were landing good body shots. The boxers were also watching when they were not competing and they knew what was scoring and not scoring. Some adjusted, some did not. Yes, the scoring system sucks and needs to be changes radically or removed!!!
In Chicago, AIBA started a new policy of sequestering the R/J’s out of the field of play, (arena). In Beijing, all of the R/J’s were kept in a small room about 30 ft by 20 ft. It had white walls and white linoleum floor. If you saw the movie “One flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest”, that’s what it felt like everyday. For the 1st 8 days, we were there for 2 sessions a day. The next 4, we had one session before we got the one day off before the last 3 days. Every day, the R/J’s took the same chairs. There were tables in there and we broke up into tribes, the French, Russian, English and Spanish speaking guys in separate corners, with a few in the middle like the Asians who did not speak the same languages and a few Europeans who did not speak one of the 4 main languages. We all got along pretty well. The ref from England had an i-pod with speakers and he would play music most days. There was one TV to watch the boxing with no scores on the screen. There was coffee, tea, sodas and cookies everyday, nothing else to eat. On the days with 2 sessions, you could go back to the hotel for less than one hour before coming back or stay at the arena. If you wanted something decent to eat, you were on your own. Guys who smoked were told they could not go out and smoke. We were only allowed to go to the bathroom or out to the arena when you were called up for the next bout. Otherwise, you had to stay in the room. It was not a lot of fun
As for the controversial bouts, I can only speak for myself. I ref’d the 81 kg bout between the Russian Beterbiev and China’s Zhang. I will readily admit that I did a terrible job. I feel rotten about it. I pride myself on being able to handle tough bouts. When I came out of the ring I said to the ref from Britain that I think I did not do a good job and felt sluggish in there. The only thing I can think of that was going through my mind was they would tell us not to over officiate but then they would also tell us to take points when needed. Contradicting themselves. I didn’t want to do what had happened to the French boxer later on. I did not want me issuing a warning that would decide the bout. I could hear when the Chinese boxer was getting points but did not know if and when the Russian was scoring because he was boxing a Chinese boxer. I thought it was close and though they were (well mostly Zhang) holding, they would break when I told them to. If Zhang kept holding on break, I am sure I would have given him a warning. Now that I have had a chance to see the bout on tape with the score, if I could do it all over again, I would have given him 1 and maybe 2 warnings if he did not stop holding. The final score was 8-2. Two warnings would have made it 8-6. I don’t know if Beterbiev would have pulled it out based on what the judges were scoring. Obviously if he wasn’t being held, he could have punched more. I really wish I could do that one over but we don’t get that chance.
That day I woke up with a sore throat and was feeling like I was getting sick. I never get sick but it turned into a cold that now 3 weeks later, I am still feeling.
It turns out Zhang got lucky more than once. I was a judge on his semi final bout against Shynaliyev from KAZ that ended 4-4 with Zhang winning on count back. I know I had the KAZ boxer winning by at least 4 maybe more. When I asked the other judges who they had winning, most had Shynaliyev but the accepted score had Zhang winning. It happens sometimes. In the finals, I thought Egan from Ireland got robbed. I went into the room next door to the R/J’s room which had a TV with the scores. On rare occasions, they would let us go in there to watch other Olympic sports but since that was the 2nd to last bout of the Olympics and they already sent out the R/J’s for the last bout, I went in there and put on the last 2 bouts to see the scores come up. Twice I saw Eagan land very clean blows and Zhang got the point. I don’t want to say what I think.
There were other bouts that were screwy. I was a judge on the 54 kg bout between Vodopyanov of Russia and Kumar of India. I had Vodopyanov winning by several. I don’t remember exactly. That bout ended 9-9 with Kumar winning. I did get to see the print out of the bout and the judges on their total score had it 2 for RUS, 2 for IND and 1 had it even. It turned out to be a 5-0 accepted for Kumar though in my mind I had it for Vodopyanov.
Many judges especially from Europe would write down their score that they kept in their head after each round. They told the judges to not do that or bring paper and pen to the judges seat. I never kept scores but everyone was doing it so I tried it to see why it was being done. It goes back to the judging criteria and judges protecting themselves. Now most judges keep the total score in their head and after the bouts we would discuss who we had winning and what the scores were that we had. This wasn’t being done so we could cheat. It was done more out of curiosity.
I was also on the Diaz-Vastine bout. I know I had Vastine winning on punches but you all saw what happened. Afterwards, the French R/J wanted to go after the ref from the Philippines who did the bout. I know the Philippines ref felt bad but just did what he thought was right. After getting to know the guy, I don’t think he had any wrong intentions. He did not know the score and did not know that he was taking the bout from the French boxer. I don’t know what else to say about it. I can’t sit in judgment after I had a bad bout as a ref. There were other tense moments in the R/J room. I know I was not happy after Raynell Williams got what I thought was a bad decision. The body shots he landed did not get scored. I thought the same thing happened to Demetrius Andrade. As for the rest of the USA team, that’s a whole different discussion.
It was a shame to see so many good boxers out of the tournament so early. Korobov was a boxer I thought would win the gold . I judged both of his bouts. He won his first bout easy enough but did not look spectacular. In his bout with Artayev from KAZ who was a gold medal winner from Athens, I thought Korobov won a close bout but again did not look very good and it turns out he lost 10-7.
I’ll save the stuff about the draw of the R/J’s for another post as this is already too long.
Fire away with questions. comments, and insults.
Jim McNally - USA
