Scoring Discrepancies, Suspect or Subjective?by Jake Donovan
Posted: 09 Sep 2006, 09:36
Blue posted this in the Current Scene...thought it was interesting.
By Jake Donovan
http://
The debates over the outcome of this past weekend’s heavyweight battle between Samuel Peter and James Toney are still raging strong throughout the boxing community. Samuel Peter was awarded a split decision in a fight where many in press row believed the opposite to be true. Crowd reaction seemed to favor Peter (or perhaps were indifferent to the outcome), while those taking in the action from the confines of their living room expressed outrage on most message boards and blog spots.
If there is anything that most seem to agree on, it’s that the two judges who
had Peter winning found their scorecards to be a bit extreme. Also common
ground appears to be a scorecard of 114-113, either way.
So how do we explain the fact that there was a four-round swing amongst the judges’ score cards this weekend? Did Dick Flaherty and Alejandro Rochin (both of whom found nine rounds to award to Peter) simply drop the ball on Saturday night? Or was it Gale Van Hoye who had a bad night?
The answer is, there is no definitive answer.
What most fans – in fact, everyone except for the three judges – seem to forget is that while we’re all watching the same two fighters in the ring, we’re not necessarily watching the same fight.
When you’re watching at ringside (as is the case with the judges), you’re only getting one view. Sometimes you have a better view of the action than your contemporaries. Other times, you’re stuck watching someone’s back jiggle for much of the three-minute frame, or the referee is obstructing your view. A judge does not have the privilege of viewing the fight from multiple camera angles. He/she does not get to hear the fight called by the announcers, or check out instant replays to see if a perceived body shot was actually a low blow.
Such is the reason why we have three judges at ringside in the first place. They are stationed at three different sides of the ring. For most televised
cards, the only side of the ring they will not be seated is the area dedicated to the broadcast team and main press section.
This also partially explains why at times the boys in press row see it considerably different than the judges. Or perhaps it’s the writers who don’t
know how to score a fight, and/or are distracted by other elements – like
writing the story to meet a deadline, or talking – or forced to listen - to the hacks around you.
That’s only part of the story, though. Even with the judges stationed at different locations, it doesn’t fully justify some of the cards turned in at the end of the night. Judges disagreeing on one or two rounds over the course of a championship fight is usually not that great of a deal. Disagreeing on four rounds raises a flag.
How about EIGHT out of twelve rounds? That was the case this past weekend.
Another example is the featherweight war two years ago between Manny Pacquiao and Juan Manuel Marquez – a bout that saw a five round swing between two of the judges, and a third judge admitting to not properly keeping up with the unified rules of the Association of Boxing Commissions (ABC) in scoring a three-knockdown round 10-7 rather than 10-6.
Ah, now we’re getting somewhere. Or are we?
The ABC hosts training seminars in various regions of the country each year. This year’s conventions were held in St. Louis and Philadelphia. I had attended the previous St. Louis seminar, at which point I was “ABC-certified,” along with every other official in the room who attended the class AND had passed an extensive written exam.
There were some interesting points introduced by class instructor and noted Nevada-based official Duane Ford (yes, the same Duane Ford who awarded round twelve to Jermain Taylor over Bernard Hopkins in their first fight). Overall it was a refresher course for most, a learning experience for others.
Anyone who closely follows the sport can rattle off the four points of scoring criteria. Clean punching, effective aggression, ring generalship and defense – but what do they really mean? Is one more important than the other?
Harold Lederman, former judge and HBO’s unofficial official, insists during broadcasts that a strong emphasis is placed on clean, effective punching. He’s not alone in that theory; the seminars even seem to hint at this. There was a segment where we were to count the number of red balls passing through a particular area. This was supposed to simulate the number of punches landed and the amount that missed or were blocked.
When asked if it meant that landed punches is what counts the most, we were told, “Use it as a tool, not as the rule.” In the end, we should just use our judgment.
Great. Now how about explaining to some of the judges the true definitions of the four points of scoring criteria, and why, in fact, we have them in the first place.
Clean punching and defense seem fairly self-explanatory. Clean punching is, quite simply, the act of landing a punch. Where it lands is vital. Anything that lands inside the shoulders and above the waist is a legal blow. Punches below the belt, to the back of the head, and on the gloves or forearms are not supposed to be taken into consideration when scoring a round.
Now, does that guarantee that all judges can accurately decipher what’s clean and what’s not a scoring blow? A good example to suggest “no” would be the recent middleweight championship contest between Jermain Taylor and Winky Wright. There were points in the fight where Taylor was catching nothing but gloves and forearms, yet was given credit by many (and perhaps a judge or two as well). Others recognized the fact that Taylor’s punches were being blocked, which takes me to the next area of scoring.
Defense is generalized as any action that causes your opponent to miss a punch. It could be ducking/slipping, blocking or using footwork to get out of harm’s way. It’s a major part of the sport – especially if you want to avoid sipping your meals through a straw for as long as possible. It is also viewed by many as the least glamorous or charismatic aspect of the sport, as well as the least significant area when scoring a fight.
On to effective aggression and ring generalship. I’d like to help, but sorry - they didn’t teach it at the seminar.
You don’t believe me? Ask Jerry Roth. He admitted on an HBO broadcast that he had absolutely no clue how to define ring generalship.
“Is it who wears the nicer trunks?” he joked.
So if a seasoned vet like ol’ Jerry is ignoring one of the major areas of scoring, then how exactly does he manage to assemble a scorecard?
Use your judgment. Count clean punches. Note who’s forcing the action, who’s taking the fight to whom. This begins to scratch the surface of what effective aggression is considered. The textbook definition (I looked it up in the part of the manual that was never read to us) is the ability to move toward your opponent while “landing” punches.
Moving forward and moving forward alone will not – excuse me – should not win you a round, or rounds. Yet in several instances, it gets rewarded, due to the fact that the other fighter isn’t throwing a windmill of punches in return.
At the risk of picking on poor Jermain, a good example would be either of his two fights against Bernard Hopkins, particularly the first one. People point to Hopkins’ low punch output in the first half of the fight as grounds for scoring the rounds for Jermain. What they ignore is that Taylor was throwing up a lot of air balls, while Hopkins, as inactive as he appeared, still landed MORE and at a much higher percentage. But because Taylor was “taking the fight to him,” he was given credit where, quite frankly, credit wasn’t due.
Ring generalship is one fighter’s ability to control the ring and/or the tempo of a fight. It could be a fighter’s ability to cut off the ring, or force an opponent to ineffectively fight on his terms. It’s not always about moving forward and walking a fighter down. You can use lateral movement, or even – close your eyes, Nevada’s finest – move backward and force your opponent to plod forward in a feeble attempt to catch up to you.
In a sense, effective aggression is almost a combination of clean punching and ring generalship. Yet at the end of the day, most seem to believe that the right formula for scoring a fight is three parts clean punching, one part effective aggression. Ring generalship becomes the parsley that accompanies most dishes – there for decoration, but most often ignored altogether. The next judge that admits to rewarding defense in the post-Willie Pep era will be the first.
The truth is that more often than not, clean punching will get you in the general vicinity of who’s winning a fight. Where we run into problems is when judges interpret whose punches are more effective. In ways, it’s an unfair advantage for the fighter considered the bigger puncher. Case in point, Peter-Toney. It’s also unfair for a judge to make anything other than… well, a judgment call when absolution in a given situation does not present itself.
It’s also not in a judge’s jurisdiction to overrule a referee’s call in the ring. This means scoring a round with one knockdown 10-8, even if you believe it to be a “flash” knockdown. It means recognizing the referee’s call on a low blow that otherwise appeared to be a clean body shot.
Speaking of 10-8 rounds, another issue often raised is when to implore such a score in the absence of a knockdown. Some take great issue with the wide range of scoring a round 10-9. Anything short of a brutal three-minute beat down is given a traditional score, which can be misleading on the cards and in the end create controversy.
Take the first fight between Antonio Tarver and Roy Jones. My scorecard for the fight read 115-113 for Roy, and because I score fights round-by-round, I couldn’t see any argument for Tarver winning the fight. I can agree that the rounds Tarver won, he won big, whereas most of the rounds Roy took were of the close, but clear variety. This created the false perception that Tarver got the better of Roy, therefore deserving to win the fight.
That seemed to be the reaction from the crowd, who voiced their displeasure loud and long once the official verdict was announced. But because Tarver never dominated any one particular round to where a 10-8 score could be awarded, he fell victim to the 10-point must system presently in place. The winner of each round gets 10 points, the loser gets 9 points are less.
An alternative: award more even rounds in the event a round is that close. Unfortunately, most judges are discouraged from such practice, as awarding too many even rounds is considered a sign of indecisiveness. This is where having four points of scoring criteria is supposed to come into play, with the lesser areas being used as tiebreakers.
At times, a judge is forced to approach a fight in sheep-like mentality. It has its pros and cons. The pros are that it does promote uniformity. The cons are that, it can also mean a blown call can ultimately cost the fighter a fight across the board.
Judges should be encouraged to use their judgment during a prizefight. Truth be told, there isn’t a single aspect of the sport that’s easy to perform. Judging being one of them. We’re forced to take in a three-minute frame, decide who’s landing the cleaner blows, who’s more effective in their fight plan, who’s dictating the pace and who’s more successful in making their opponent miss.
It’s not an exact science, yet the moment the round ends, the judge has to decide who won the round in less time than it takes for the referee to reach his arm through the ropes and collect your card. It’s a matter of seconds, if even that much.
In the end, we’re still left with searching for a better way to get everyone on the same page. Maybe the problem is getting better people to open and teach what’s in the textbook. Maybe the problem is the manner in which officials are certified.
Whatever the case, boxing remains the only sport as subjective as it is on every level. Bad calls are argued in every other sport, but at the end of a game, the team that scores more runs/baskets/goals is the winner.
Boxing is the last remaining organized sport where we can’t seem to agree on the final score. But does that make it suspect or subjective? Or both?
You be the judge.
By Jake Donovan
http://
The debates over the outcome of this past weekend’s heavyweight battle between Samuel Peter and James Toney are still raging strong throughout the boxing community. Samuel Peter was awarded a split decision in a fight where many in press row believed the opposite to be true. Crowd reaction seemed to favor Peter (or perhaps were indifferent to the outcome), while those taking in the action from the confines of their living room expressed outrage on most message boards and blog spots.
If there is anything that most seem to agree on, it’s that the two judges who
had Peter winning found their scorecards to be a bit extreme. Also common
ground appears to be a scorecard of 114-113, either way.
So how do we explain the fact that there was a four-round swing amongst the judges’ score cards this weekend? Did Dick Flaherty and Alejandro Rochin (both of whom found nine rounds to award to Peter) simply drop the ball on Saturday night? Or was it Gale Van Hoye who had a bad night?
The answer is, there is no definitive answer.
What most fans – in fact, everyone except for the three judges – seem to forget is that while we’re all watching the same two fighters in the ring, we’re not necessarily watching the same fight.
When you’re watching at ringside (as is the case with the judges), you’re only getting one view. Sometimes you have a better view of the action than your contemporaries. Other times, you’re stuck watching someone’s back jiggle for much of the three-minute frame, or the referee is obstructing your view. A judge does not have the privilege of viewing the fight from multiple camera angles. He/she does not get to hear the fight called by the announcers, or check out instant replays to see if a perceived body shot was actually a low blow.
Such is the reason why we have three judges at ringside in the first place. They are stationed at three different sides of the ring. For most televised
cards, the only side of the ring they will not be seated is the area dedicated to the broadcast team and main press section.
This also partially explains why at times the boys in press row see it considerably different than the judges. Or perhaps it’s the writers who don’t
know how to score a fight, and/or are distracted by other elements – like
writing the story to meet a deadline, or talking – or forced to listen - to the hacks around you.
That’s only part of the story, though. Even with the judges stationed at different locations, it doesn’t fully justify some of the cards turned in at the end of the night. Judges disagreeing on one or two rounds over the course of a championship fight is usually not that great of a deal. Disagreeing on four rounds raises a flag.
How about EIGHT out of twelve rounds? That was the case this past weekend.
Another example is the featherweight war two years ago between Manny Pacquiao and Juan Manuel Marquez – a bout that saw a five round swing between two of the judges, and a third judge admitting to not properly keeping up with the unified rules of the Association of Boxing Commissions (ABC) in scoring a three-knockdown round 10-7 rather than 10-6.
Ah, now we’re getting somewhere. Or are we?
The ABC hosts training seminars in various regions of the country each year. This year’s conventions were held in St. Louis and Philadelphia. I had attended the previous St. Louis seminar, at which point I was “ABC-certified,” along with every other official in the room who attended the class AND had passed an extensive written exam.
There were some interesting points introduced by class instructor and noted Nevada-based official Duane Ford (yes, the same Duane Ford who awarded round twelve to Jermain Taylor over Bernard Hopkins in their first fight). Overall it was a refresher course for most, a learning experience for others.
Anyone who closely follows the sport can rattle off the four points of scoring criteria. Clean punching, effective aggression, ring generalship and defense – but what do they really mean? Is one more important than the other?
Harold Lederman, former judge and HBO’s unofficial official, insists during broadcasts that a strong emphasis is placed on clean, effective punching. He’s not alone in that theory; the seminars even seem to hint at this. There was a segment where we were to count the number of red balls passing through a particular area. This was supposed to simulate the number of punches landed and the amount that missed or were blocked.
When asked if it meant that landed punches is what counts the most, we were told, “Use it as a tool, not as the rule.” In the end, we should just use our judgment.
Great. Now how about explaining to some of the judges the true definitions of the four points of scoring criteria, and why, in fact, we have them in the first place.
Clean punching and defense seem fairly self-explanatory. Clean punching is, quite simply, the act of landing a punch. Where it lands is vital. Anything that lands inside the shoulders and above the waist is a legal blow. Punches below the belt, to the back of the head, and on the gloves or forearms are not supposed to be taken into consideration when scoring a round.
Now, does that guarantee that all judges can accurately decipher what’s clean and what’s not a scoring blow? A good example to suggest “no” would be the recent middleweight championship contest between Jermain Taylor and Winky Wright. There were points in the fight where Taylor was catching nothing but gloves and forearms, yet was given credit by many (and perhaps a judge or two as well). Others recognized the fact that Taylor’s punches were being blocked, which takes me to the next area of scoring.
Defense is generalized as any action that causes your opponent to miss a punch. It could be ducking/slipping, blocking or using footwork to get out of harm’s way. It’s a major part of the sport – especially if you want to avoid sipping your meals through a straw for as long as possible. It is also viewed by many as the least glamorous or charismatic aspect of the sport, as well as the least significant area when scoring a fight.
On to effective aggression and ring generalship. I’d like to help, but sorry - they didn’t teach it at the seminar.
You don’t believe me? Ask Jerry Roth. He admitted on an HBO broadcast that he had absolutely no clue how to define ring generalship.
“Is it who wears the nicer trunks?” he joked.
So if a seasoned vet like ol’ Jerry is ignoring one of the major areas of scoring, then how exactly does he manage to assemble a scorecard?
Use your judgment. Count clean punches. Note who’s forcing the action, who’s taking the fight to whom. This begins to scratch the surface of what effective aggression is considered. The textbook definition (I looked it up in the part of the manual that was never read to us) is the ability to move toward your opponent while “landing” punches.
Moving forward and moving forward alone will not – excuse me – should not win you a round, or rounds. Yet in several instances, it gets rewarded, due to the fact that the other fighter isn’t throwing a windmill of punches in return.
At the risk of picking on poor Jermain, a good example would be either of his two fights against Bernard Hopkins, particularly the first one. People point to Hopkins’ low punch output in the first half of the fight as grounds for scoring the rounds for Jermain. What they ignore is that Taylor was throwing up a lot of air balls, while Hopkins, as inactive as he appeared, still landed MORE and at a much higher percentage. But because Taylor was “taking the fight to him,” he was given credit where, quite frankly, credit wasn’t due.
Ring generalship is one fighter’s ability to control the ring and/or the tempo of a fight. It could be a fighter’s ability to cut off the ring, or force an opponent to ineffectively fight on his terms. It’s not always about moving forward and walking a fighter down. You can use lateral movement, or even – close your eyes, Nevada’s finest – move backward and force your opponent to plod forward in a feeble attempt to catch up to you.
In a sense, effective aggression is almost a combination of clean punching and ring generalship. Yet at the end of the day, most seem to believe that the right formula for scoring a fight is three parts clean punching, one part effective aggression. Ring generalship becomes the parsley that accompanies most dishes – there for decoration, but most often ignored altogether. The next judge that admits to rewarding defense in the post-Willie Pep era will be the first.
The truth is that more often than not, clean punching will get you in the general vicinity of who’s winning a fight. Where we run into problems is when judges interpret whose punches are more effective. In ways, it’s an unfair advantage for the fighter considered the bigger puncher. Case in point, Peter-Toney. It’s also unfair for a judge to make anything other than… well, a judgment call when absolution in a given situation does not present itself.
It’s also not in a judge’s jurisdiction to overrule a referee’s call in the ring. This means scoring a round with one knockdown 10-8, even if you believe it to be a “flash” knockdown. It means recognizing the referee’s call on a low blow that otherwise appeared to be a clean body shot.
Speaking of 10-8 rounds, another issue often raised is when to implore such a score in the absence of a knockdown. Some take great issue with the wide range of scoring a round 10-9. Anything short of a brutal three-minute beat down is given a traditional score, which can be misleading on the cards and in the end create controversy.
Take the first fight between Antonio Tarver and Roy Jones. My scorecard for the fight read 115-113 for Roy, and because I score fights round-by-round, I couldn’t see any argument for Tarver winning the fight. I can agree that the rounds Tarver won, he won big, whereas most of the rounds Roy took were of the close, but clear variety. This created the false perception that Tarver got the better of Roy, therefore deserving to win the fight.
That seemed to be the reaction from the crowd, who voiced their displeasure loud and long once the official verdict was announced. But because Tarver never dominated any one particular round to where a 10-8 score could be awarded, he fell victim to the 10-point must system presently in place. The winner of each round gets 10 points, the loser gets 9 points are less.
An alternative: award more even rounds in the event a round is that close. Unfortunately, most judges are discouraged from such practice, as awarding too many even rounds is considered a sign of indecisiveness. This is where having four points of scoring criteria is supposed to come into play, with the lesser areas being used as tiebreakers.
At times, a judge is forced to approach a fight in sheep-like mentality. It has its pros and cons. The pros are that it does promote uniformity. The cons are that, it can also mean a blown call can ultimately cost the fighter a fight across the board.
Judges should be encouraged to use their judgment during a prizefight. Truth be told, there isn’t a single aspect of the sport that’s easy to perform. Judging being one of them. We’re forced to take in a three-minute frame, decide who’s landing the cleaner blows, who’s more effective in their fight plan, who’s dictating the pace and who’s more successful in making their opponent miss.
It’s not an exact science, yet the moment the round ends, the judge has to decide who won the round in less time than it takes for the referee to reach his arm through the ropes and collect your card. It’s a matter of seconds, if even that much.
In the end, we’re still left with searching for a better way to get everyone on the same page. Maybe the problem is getting better people to open and teach what’s in the textbook. Maybe the problem is the manner in which officials are certified.
Whatever the case, boxing remains the only sport as subjective as it is on every level. Bad calls are argued in every other sport, but at the end of a game, the team that scores more runs/baskets/goals is the winner.
Boxing is the last remaining organized sport where we can’t seem to agree on the final score. But does that make it suspect or subjective? Or both?
You be the judge.