Did you feel the decision for Sherk vs Dunham was controversial ?

Yes, Dunham won that fight.

freakzilla316ftw wrote:

Yes, Dunham won that fight.

You can make a case for Dunham coming on strong at the end but does it really classify as controversial ? Sherk dominated the first round to the point where you could maybe score it 10-8.

Ali_1748 wrote:

freakzilla316ftw wrote:

Yes, Dunham won that fight.

You can make a case for Dunham coming on strong at the end but does it really classify as controversial ? Sherk dominated the first round to the point where you could maybe score it 10-8.

Uhhhh.... no. You can't. The only round that could be construed as overwhelmingly dominant was the third (I don't consider it dominant enough to be a 10-8, but I could see the argument). Dunham clearly won the second and third rounds. He was the only fighter with effective offense in the second round. He had multiple submission attempts, an effective jab, more power shots landed. This decision was horrible. And the Stephens one was bad, too. The judges were terrible last night.

I need to watch it again, at the time I wasn't that outraged with the decision but alot of people seem convinced Dunham won.

Honestly the Sherk/Dunham fight could have gone either way. Dominant My ass. Dunham was getting hit with just as many punches in those exchanges as Sherk was. The only difference in any of it was that Dunham was throwing that same flying knee over and over that landed but he never once got close to putting Sherk away with strikes. Meanwhile Sherk opened up two big gashes in the first and second rounds on Dunham head. 29-28 either way is no robbery.

Guillards fight with Stevens was also very hard to score. Stevens landed more kicks but Melvin was clowning him with the "look ma, no hands" routine while flashing in and and out to tag Stevens repeatedly almost without consequence. The only thing that got Me upset was the dumbass who scored it 30-27 Guillard. 29-28 or even 29-29 (some saw round two as a 10-10 round) either way wouldn't bother Me.

No, I thought Sherk won the first 2 rounds

it was all about the 2nd rnd. I thought Dunham won it, but Sherk did control the first 3.5 mins of the rnd.

very close fight, but I don't think it was controversial.

Apparently people don't know how fights are supposed to be scored. Hopefully this helps. Straight from the Unified Rules


18) SCORING TECHNIQUES:

A) Using the 10-Point Must Scoring System; judges are required to determine a winner of a contest that ends after the Initial scheduled number of rounds have been completed. 10 points must be awarded to the winner of the round and nine points or less must be awarded to the loser, except for a rare even round, which is scored (10-10).

B) Mixed Martial Arts Techniques are defined as:
1) “Effective Striking”: The total number of legal heavy strikes landed
2) “Effective Grappling”: The successful execution of a legal takedown and/or reversal including the following maneuvers:
a) Takedowns from standing position to mount position;
b) Passing the guard to mount position;
c) Bottom position fighters using an active, threatening guard.

3) “Octagon Control”: Dictating the pace, location and position of the contest using the following maneuvers:
a) Countering a grappler’s attempt at takedown to remain standing and legally striking effectively;
b) Taking down an opponent to force a ground fight;
c) Creating threatening submission attempts pass the guard to achieve mount, while on the ground;
d) Creating striking opportunities, while on the ground.

4) “Effective Aggressiveness”: Moving forward and setting the tempo of the contest while effectively scoring with legal strikes, takedowns, and submissions while blocking the opponents counters.

5) “Effective Defense”: Successful avoidance or defense of blows and submissions by which an opponent is made to miss by definite maneuvers. However, one who demonstrates these skills must also strike effectively to positively influence the judges’ scoring.

6) “Intelligent Defense”: An active defense that effectively neutralizes an opponent’s attack, particularly when the defender is mounted, either from the front or the back. An intelligent defense minimizes the potential for damage while providing the opportunity for taking back the offense.

C) Scoring of the above techniques shall be given the most weight as follows:

1) Effective Striking
2) Effective Grappling
3) Octagon Control
4) Effective Aggressiveness/Defense

Evaluations shall be made in the order in which the techniques appear above, giving the most weight in scoring to effective striking, grappling, octagon control and aggressiveness/defense.

So, based on this, Dunham clearly should have won the second round. He was the more effective grappler and striker. He had the "active, threatening guard" that is required to be considered the more effective grappler. He landed more strikes of significance. Sherk may have been slightly better in Octagon control, but landing 2 of 8 takedown attempts in a round isn't exactly what I would consider obvious control.

chorky777 wrote:

So, based on this, Dunham clearly should have won the second round. He was the more effective grappler and striker. He had the "active, threatening guard" that is required to be considered the more effective grappler. He landed more strikes of significance. Sherk may have been slightly better in Octagon control, but landing 2 of 8 takedown attempts in a round isn't exactly what I would consider obvious control.

an "active threatening gaurd" is REQUIRED to be considered the more effective grappler?

If your going to post the rules as if nobody else knows them, do not blantly misinterpret the rules in your very next post.

captain organic wrote:

chorky777 wrote:

So, based on this, Dunham clearly should have won the second round. He was the more effective grappler and striker. He had the "active, threatening guard" that is required to be considered the more effective grappler. He landed more strikes of significance. Sherk may have been slightly better in Octagon control, but landing 2 of 8 takedown attempts in a round isn't exactly what I would consider obvious control.

an "active threatening gaurd" is REQUIRED to be considered the more effective grappler?

If your going to post the rules as if nobody else knows them, do not blantly misinterpret the rules in your very next post.

It's the only thing the bottom grappler can do to be considered the more effective grappler, so it is required. As for the other things that can be done by the person on top, passing into mount and taking down into mount, Sherk did neither. Sherk worked for a side mount to escape the first guillotine, but couldn't do it. Dunham kept him in his half-guard, and it was threatening. Definitively more effective grappling was shown by Dunham.

how threatening Dunham's gaurd was is open to debate.

Again I had Dunham winning. the 2nd rnd was clearly the swing rnd, Sherk dictated the pace for most of it, dunham came on strong late. Close rnd.

the decision is shaky at best.

only people who would not 2nd guess it are sherk fans or people who had money on sherk

I watched the fight 4 times and I actually tried to score it in favor of Sherk and he still lost. He was not as dominating in strikes and grappling from the 2nd round on as Dunham was, but the kid was gracious as can be and they seemed like they had a good time.

So Dunham had an "active and threatening" guard because he managed to get sliced and diced from guard while Sherk wasn't even thinking "I need to pass"? Whats clear is that round one was 10-9 Sherk, and round three was 10-9 Dunham. Round two could be looked at one of two ways:

Scenario 1) We take into account that Sherk utilized effective grappling and octagon control to eat up 3 and a half minutes of the round taking Dunham down twice. 3 and a half minutes being 70% of a 5 minute round.

Scenario 2) We give more credit to Dunham who after a thirty second lapse in action really poured it on with striking for the last sixty seconds of the round enough to turn the tide of the judges decision.

Honestly, as I said before, a 29-28 score either way doesn't surprise Me. There are good points for both fighters as to why they did or didn't win the fight in anyone's opinion. But to say the decision is controversial or that Dunham got screwed by a split decision in which all three judges scored the fight 29-28 for one fighter or another is a bit over the top.

I had it 29-28 Sherk but i can see a case for 29-28 Dunham as well. What i consider controversial was Lil Nog not only getting robbed, but robbed by a landslide against Bader.

it was a close fight, and it could have gone either way but that doesn't mean that Dunham got robbed!

LudoCain wrote:

So Dunham had an "active and threatening" guard because he managed to get sliced and diced from guard while Sherk wasn't even thinking "I need to pass"? Whats clear is that round one was 10-9 Sherk, and round three was 10-9 Dunham. Round two could be looked at one of two ways:

Scenario 1) We take into account that Sherk utilized effective grappling and octagon control to eat up 3 and a half minutes of the round taking Dunham down twice. 3 and a half minutes being 70% of a 5 minute round.

Scenario 2) We give more credit to Dunham who after a thirty second lapse in action really poured it on with striking for the last sixty seconds of the round enough to turn the tide of the judges decision.

Honestly, as I said before, a 29-28 score either way doesn't surprise Me. There are good points for both fighters as to why they did or didn't win the fight in anyone's opinion. But to say the decision is controversial or that Dunham got screwed by a split decision in which all three judges scored the fight 29-28 for one fighter or another is a bit over the top.

Scenario 1) Sherk only used effective octagon control. Effective grappling was absolutely absent from him. There was none. The only person using effective grappling was Evan Dunham by using the active and threatening guard. I don't know where you think Sherk was slicing and dicing him, but it wasn't in the second round. He landed 0 strikes while on top of Dunham. If you look at the FightMetric stats that I'll post at the end, it will say 3 ground jabs to the head. Those were while Dunham was working his way up and still had his hand on the floor. Sherk literally did nothing with the takedowns. He only got caught in submissions, or Dunham worked his way up without harm. There is no reason Sherk should have won that second round. He was thoroughly outstruck and outgrappled. He had an edge in Octagon control early, but that is to be scored on less of a weight as striking and grappling. Anybody properly scoring fights would have this fight scored for Dunham, and there is no way around it. Dunham was jobbed by poor judging from 2 of the worst judges in MMA history. Glen Trowbridge and Cecil peoples shouldn't be allowed to judge this sport. They've shown time and time again that they are incompetent, and this is just another case of it.

Scenario 2) Not how I'd put it, but whatever.

http://blog.fightmetric.com/2010/09/sherk-vs-dunham-fightmetric-report.html

Round 1- Sherk
Round 2- Sherk- the closest round of the fight
round 3- Dunham

I think that is how most people saw the fight.

OUSOONERSOU wrote:

Round 1- Sherk
Round 2- Sherk- the closest round of the fight
round 3- Dunham

I think that is how most people saw the fight.

No. I gave Dunham the 2nd round.

freakzilla316ftw wrote:

OUSOONERSOU wrote:

Round 1- Sherk
Round 2- Sherk- the closest round of the fight
round 3- Dunham

I think that is how most people saw the fight.

No. I gave Dunham the 2nd round.

I said most not all. The majority give Sherk a close 2nd round.

chorky777 wrote:

LudoCain wrote:

So Dunham had an "active and threatening" guard because he managed to get sliced and diced from guard while Sherk wasn't even thinking "I need to pass"? Whats clear is that round one was 10-9 Sherk, and round three was 10-9 Dunham. Round two could be looked at one of two ways:

Scenario 1) We take into account that Sherk utilized effective grappling and octagon control to eat up 3 and a half minutes of the round taking Dunham down twice. 3 and a half minutes being 70% of a 5 minute round.

Scenario 2) We give more credit to Dunham who after a thirty second lapse in action really poured it on with striking for the last sixty seconds of the round enough to turn the tide of the judges decision.

Honestly, as I said before, a 29-28 score either way doesn't surprise Me. There are good points for both fighters as to why they did or didn't win the fight in anyone's opinion. But to say the decision is controversial or that Dunham got screwed by a split decision in which all three judges scored the fight 29-28 for one fighter or another is a bit over the top.

Scenario 1) Sherk only used effective octagon control. Effective grappling was absolutely absent from him. There was none. The only person using effective grappling was Evan Dunham by using the active and threatening guard. I don't know where you think Sherk was slicing and dicing him, but it wasn't in the second round. He landed 0 strikes while on top of Dunham. If you look at the FightMetric stats that I'll post at the end, it will say 3 ground jabs to the head. Those were while Dunham was working his way up and still had his hand on the floor. Sherk literally did nothing with the takedowns. He only got caught in submissions, or Dunham worked his way up without harm. There is no reason Sherk should have won that second round. He was thoroughly outstruck and outgrappled. He had an edge in Octagon control early, but that is to be scored on less of a weight as striking and grappling. Anybody properly scoring fights would have this fight scored for Dunham, and there is no way around it. Dunham was jobbed by poor judging from 2 of the worst judges in MMA history. Glen Trowbridge and Cecil peoples shouldn't be allowed to judge this sport. They've shown time and time again that they are incompetent, and this is just another case of it.

Scenario 2) Not how I'd put it, but whatever.

http://blog.fightmetric.com/2010/09/sherk-vs-dunham-fightmetric-report.html

So we are to give no credit for takedowns that were not successfully stuffed(even though stuffed initially), and we are then to give credit to failed submission attempts on the way down? Sherk may have gotten caught in the same submission all night(which is sort of indicitive that he didn't much mind them) but not a one of them succeeded. He managed to scramble or slide out of every single one of them and always ended up on top when he did it. I just don't see how we throw out the first three and a half minutes of effective grappling and control in favor of roughly a minute's worth of desperation brawling. Yes Sherk was rocked during that minute but it isn't like he was getting picked apart standing. He was landing punches of his own as well even after just being rocked. Damage is hard to ignore and two heavily bleeding cuts in two rounds of action definitely would help a judge to make up his mind. Even if we aren't taking into account the first cut as it happened in round one we stil have a cut being opened on Evans head in round two as well. Couple that with the first three minutes being controlled and the two takedowns definitely makes a case that Sherk could have won the round. To say there is no way around scoring this fight for Dunham is drastic plain and simple. You want to talk about being Jobbed I felt Stephens has a much better case seeing as one judge scored against him in every single round of that fight.

OUSOONERSOU wrote:

freakzilla316ftw wrote:

OUSOONERSOU wrote:

Round 1- Sherk
Round 2- Sherk- the closest round of the fight
round 3- Dunham

I think that is how most people saw the fight.

No. I gave Dunham the 2nd round.

I said most not all. The majority give Sherk a close 2nd round.

No, a large majority gave Dunham the second round, including every reputable website covering the event.

http://www.sherdog.com/news/news/UFC-119-Results-amp-Live-Play-by-Play-27034
http://mmajunkie.com/news/20784/ufc-119-play-by-play-and-live-results.mma
http://www.mmafighting.com/2010/09/25/ufc-119-live-blog-sean-sherk-vs-evan-dunham-updates/
http://www.mmaweekly.com/absolutenm/templates/dailynews.asp?articleid=12699&zoneid=3
http://www.mmamania.com/2010/9/2/1665166/ufc-119-results-and-live-fight

Sherdog also did a poll where it was 65% to 26%

It wasn't close. It should've been Dunham's round.

LudoCain wrote:

chorky777 wrote:

LudoCain wrote:

So Dunham had an "active and threatening" guard because he managed to get sliced and diced from guard while Sherk wasn't even thinking "I need to pass"? Whats clear is that round one was 10-9 Sherk, and round three was 10-9 Dunham. Round two could be looked at one of two ways:

Scenario 1) We take into account that Sherk utilized effective grappling and octagon control to eat up 3 and a half minutes of the round taking Dunham down twice. 3 and a half minutes being 70% of a 5 minute round.

Scenario 2) We give more credit to Dunham who after a thirty second lapse in action really poured it on with striking for the last sixty seconds of the round enough to turn the tide of the judges decision.

Honestly, as I said before, a 29-28 score either way doesn't surprise Me. There are good points for both fighters as to why they did or didn't win the fight in anyone's opinion. But to say the decision is controversial or that Dunham got screwed by a split decision in which all three judges scored the fight 29-28 for one fighter or another is a bit over the top.

Scenario 1) Sherk only used effective octagon control. Effective grappling was absolutely absent from him. There was none. The only person using effective grappling was Evan Dunham by using the active and threatening guard. I don't know where you think Sherk was slicing and dicing him, but it wasn't in the second round. He landed 0 strikes while on top of Dunham. If you look at the FightMetric stats that I'll post at the end, it will say 3 ground jabs to the head. Those were while Dunham was working his way up and still had his hand on the floor. Sherk literally did nothing with the takedowns. He only got caught in submissions, or Dunham worked his way up without harm. There is no reason Sherk should have won that second round. He was thoroughly outstruck and outgrappled. He had an edge in Octagon control early, but that is to be scored on less of a weight as striking and grappling. Anybody properly scoring fights would have this fight scored for Dunham, and there is no way around it. Dunham was jobbed by poor judging from 2 of the worst judges in MMA history. Glen Trowbridge and Cecil peoples shouldn't be allowed to judge this sport. They've shown time and time again that they are incompetent, and this is just another case of it.

Scenario 2) Not how I'd put it, but whatever.

http://blog.fightmetric.com/2010/09/sherk-vs-dunham-fightmetric-report.html

So we are to give no credit for takedowns that were not successfully stuffed(even though stuffed initially), and we are then to give credit to failed submission attempts on the way down? Sherk may have gotten caught in the same submission all night(which is sort of indicitive that he didn't much mind them) but not a one of them succeeded. He managed to scramble or slide out of every single one of them and always ended up on top when he did it. I just don't see how we throw out the first three and a half minutes of effective grappling and control in favor of roughly a minute's worth of desperation brawling. Yes Sherk was rocked during that minute but it isn't like he was getting picked apart standing. He was landing punches of his own as well even after just being rocked. Damage is hard to ignore and two heavily bleeding cuts in two rounds of action definitely would help a judge to make up his mind. Even if we aren't taking into account the first cut as it happened in round one we stil have a cut being opened on Evans head in round two as well. Couple that with the first three minutes being controlled and the two takedowns definitely makes a case that Sherk could have won the round. To say there is no way around scoring this fight for Dunham is drastic plain and simple. You want to talk about being Jobbed I felt Stephens has a much better case seeing as one judge scored against him in every single round of that fight.

You definitely give credit for takedowns. That's called control. It is taken into consideration, but weighed less than grappling and striking. Now you said there were 3 and a half minutes of effective grappling and control, but I keep explaining, he wasn't effectively grappling. He was only controlling. As for the 3 and a half minutes, over a minute of it was Sherk fighting off guillotines. Most of the rest of that time was Dunham fighting off the takedown attempts, which is also considered for control. In order to be scored as in control, you're supposed to force a ground fight with your takedown. Not just get the takedown. You have to do something while you're there. It's in the rules, I posted them. There were four attempted submissions from guard in that period. That's effective grappling for Dunham, also in the rules. As for the damage, a small cut outside of the eye is superfluous. It's an easily cut area, and damage from a solid head blow is usually greater than that of a cut. You just think of cuts as being the only damage because it's visible. And I agree about the Stephens thing.