UFC color commentator Dan Hardy was not happy with referee Herb Dean during the UFC on ESPN 14 event.
Herb Dean was once recognized as one of the best officials in the MMA game but many argue that he has regressed. The general consensus is that Dean dropped the ball during the UFC on ESPN 14 event. Most would agree that he stopped the heavyweight bout between Tanner Boser and Raphael Pessoa too late. The more egregious stoppage was during the Francisco Trinaldo vs. Jai Herbert bout. It appeared quite clear that Trinaldo had Herbert seeing stars after landing a punch but Dean didn’t stop the fight until Trinaldo landed a few more shots.
UFC To Take Closer Look At Dan Hardy-Herb Dean Incident
Hardy and Paul Felder, who were on the call for UFC on ESPN 14, were critical of Dean during the broadcast. Hardy in particular was enraged with Dean’s stoppage.
While one would say Hardy was doing his job by analyzing and calling things how he saw them, he also had some words with Dean after the fight.
“I’m doing my job, now do yours.”
During the post-fight press conference, UFC senior vice president David Shaw said the promotion will look into the incident (h/t MMAJunkie).
“The important thing for us to do is to try and get a handle and try to get an understanding of what actually happened. Obviously, this is not something that you address with either one of the parties during the show. These guys have a job to do and so we certainly don’t want to disrupt their efforts to do an excellent job, as we expect they always will. So we’ll go back, we’ll check it out, try to get a better understanding of what happened and really take it from there.”
