UFC 302, The Morning After: The Gloves Still SUCK!

Here’s what you may have missed!

UFC 302 wasn’t the most memorable of pay-per-view (PPV) events. There were some quality scraps throughout, certainly, but the sheer amount of decisions bogged the night down a bit. Dustin Poirier’s unexpectedly great showing against Islam Makhachev helped save the card to an extent, but Makhachev still won via submission as most predicted.

The standout trend of the night was an unfortunate one: eye pokes. On the eve of the new gloves being introduced, there were a LOT of eye pokes! The very first fight of the evening between Andre Lima and Mitch Raposo saw three eye pokes alone. I want to make a “Nobody saw it coming!” pun, but that would be dishonest, because Sean Strickland was arguing that the gloves sucked days before the event.

The new gloves situation is a curious thing. Fans and fighters alike have been begging for a solution to the eye poke epidemic for about as long as I can remember, and there was a brief moment of rejoice when the promotion announced they were revamping the gloves. Then, the press releases came out, and there was shockingly little information about how the new gloves would improve on the eye poke problem.

Seriously, look at the information sheet below. Do you read the words “eye poke” anywhere? At best, there’s a vague mention of “scooped/angled finger holes,” but that’s it!

UFC 302 serves as direct evidence that the new gloves weren’t intended to fix the eye poke problem. Nothing seems to have changed! Hell, during Randy Brown vs. Elizeu Zaleski, UFC color commentator Joe Rogan admitted on air that the gloves haven’t changed anything.

Speaking of Brown vs. Zaleski: what a perfect demonstration of the eye poke problem. We’re talking about a really close fight, one that could have gone either way. Brown landed some crushing knees and a lot of sharp jabs, but Zaleski also stunned him on a couple occasions with his overhand right and nearly secured a rear naked choke in the second. There were plenty of momentum shifts, but Brown ultimately captured the first and third frame to score a victory.

He was aided by three eye pokes! I’m not saying Zaleski wins if not for the eye pokes, but I am arguing we’ll never know. He might have! Three eye pokes is a considerable advantage for Brown, particularly since the referee wouldn’t even acknowledge two of the three. In the first, Zaleski was in the middle of blinking away a poke when Brown started unleashing point-scoring combinations in a key round.

It’s unfair to the fighters and downright irritating to watch. Fixing eye pokes should’ve been the primary purpose of the glove rework, and that’s simply not the case.

Perhaps the most frustrating aspect of the whole problem is that a solution has already been found. PRIDE gloves were more curved, and top MMA coach Trevor Wittman came up with his own prototype gloves that were also intended to curb eye pokes. The technology is out there! Rather than embrace those options or at least address the real issue with the new revamp, these new gloves have data chips that make them easier to sell after the fights.

Priorities.

For complete UFC 302: “Makhachev vs. Poirier” results and play-by-play, click HERE!