Daniel Cormier thinks something was wrong some of the officiating at UFC on ESPN 34.
Cormier, who called the action at the UFC Apex in Las Vegas, questions how referee Dan Miragliotta and Nevada Athletic Commission handled two instances of illegal blows that ended bouts on Saturday.
This happened in the middleweight co-headliner between Caio Borralho and Gadzhi Omargadzhiev and a heavyweight prelim pitting Martin Buday against Chris Barnett.
Instead of a no contest or a disqualification, the fights ended as technical decisions in favor of Borralho and Buday, who were up on the scorecards but also responsible for the infractions. In Borralho’s case, an illegal knee; Buday, an illegal elbow. Because Miragliotta ruled that both illegal strikes were unintentional, the fights were judged on the action until the illegal blows occurred.
Cormier questions the logic behind the final outcomes.
“Listen, so you’re told the rules in the locker room, right?” Cormeir said on the UFC on ESPN 34 broadcast. “They say the strike’s unintentional. But everything you throw in there is with intent, so how do you call it unintentional and you don’t disqualify? Now I’m not saying disqualify Borralho or disqualify the guy earlier (Buday), but everything you throw is with intent to finish the fight. So how do you call it unintentional?”
Cormier later made it clear on Twitter that both Borralho and Buday should have been disqualified.
No knock on Caio or Martin but every single time I threw a strike in the octagon it was intentional. They both should have been disqualified! #ufconespn
— Daniel Cormier (@dc_mma) April 17, 2022
Specifically in the Borralho fight, he was deducted a point for the illegal knee, which only adds to the confusion.
“You can’t have it both ways,” Cormier said. “You can’t take the point and then say it’s not a disqualification.”
Cormier went on to point out how fighters could exploit potential loopholes because of this type of ruling.
“So win 2 rounds, throw an unintentional illegal strike and then hope they [sic] guy can’t continue,” Cormier tweeted. “So that ya’ll go to the judges right then. Sh*t, you don’t run the risk of losing.”