This year, the most controversial scorecards have come in the UFC’s lightweight division. First, in April, Al Iaquinta won a split decision over longtime gatekeeper to the top 15 Jorge Masvidal at “UFC Fight Morning” in Fairfax, Virginia. Four months later in Nashville, Beneil Dariush eked out his own split decision over the toughest opponent of his career so far, Michael Johnson. While probably not a bad decision as it’s often played up is, it was still a shock when Dariush was announced as the winner.
While visiting Kings MMA in Los Angeles, California, GNP1.de conducted the above interview with Dariush. He has a pretty simple explanation for why the fight was so controversial: Fans were swayed by color commentator Kenny Florian treating the fight as a walk in the park for Johnson.
I re-watched the fight a couple of times. And to be honest, the first time I’ve watched it, I watched it with the volume on, where I felt like the commentators were really favoring him. And I felt like, ‘Whoa man, it looked like a very convincing win for him.’ And then I re-watched it and I put it on mute the second time. Then I realized the fight was way closer. It’s true he won the first round, and I definitely won the third round. I out-landed him, out-worked him. The second round was the close round.
So if you look at it, I finished stronger than he did. And another thing is, too, as far as the Fight Metrics, we were really close. He landed a few more punches, but I landed more head shots. He landed more body shots. So if you’re looking at it, it wasn’t like it was a landslide victory for him, it wasn’t a landslide victory for me. It wasn’t like, after the fight I was like, ‘Yeah, I won the fight, I’m going crazy or something’. It was a close fight. I get it, and I understand why a lot of fans are angry. If they’re his fans, they’re gonna be angry about him. If they’re my fans, they’re gonna be happy for me.
Later:
I think it had to do a lot with the way the commentators were speaking. And I think the way they judged the fight, everybody else kind of judged it. I’m not blaming the commentators, but I think they do have some ties to Michael Johnson, so it’s possible they were favoring him from the beginning. That’s why their judging went in that direction.
Kenny Florian and Rashad Evans are very close, I believe. Rashad Evans is a training partner of Michael Johnson and Rashad Evans also is very vocal about how dominant Michael Johnson was. He made it sound like Michael Johnson won every round and (like) he won the all clearly. Again, if you watch it again, watch it on mute. You can be the judge yourself.
Regardless of what you think about that specific fight, he has a legitimate point about how commentary affects how we view fights. It becomes part of the narrative of the fight.
