What Would be Your Idea to Improve Judging?

[daggum]

it has nothing to do with judging. your question should be how do you stop corruption in boxing. you think its a coincidence 99 percent of the time the a-side guy gets favorable treatment and the judges suddenly become his biggest fan? its a system where they know either implicitly or explicitly to score for the a-side. why they do this is unknown: future fights, they want to get in their good graces, they think the other judges are scoring it for the a-side, etc....you think the judges suddenly started loving ward and decided to give him round 10 when he was dominated in that round? they know math better than you think and thats proof. oh no we cant spare one more round ok just give them all to ward even if he clearly lost them. they should have spaced out their bad scoring a little better but they can still do math

[Citizen Koba]

It's not a matter of majority or minority. It's a matter of logic or lack or logic. It wouldn't be special to be a genius if the majority of people weren't completely ******ed or, at best, extremely biased. Objectively speaking, while really analyzing each round with an open mind, there can't be any doubt.

Tell me the rounds you scored for Kovalev.
Tell me the rounds you scored for Golovkin.
We can go through each round, count the significant punches (**** compubox), evaluate the damage done, take closer looks at who has interpreted what wrong.

Golovkin was zombie-walking around, unable to do any significant damage to Canelo, while Canelo fought very well defensively and landed a lot of counter punches cleanly. Golovkin was very hesitant with taking any chances and when Canelo was on the ropes, Golovkin would look clueless until Canelo started hitting him (and still look clueless after that, as his own counter punches weren't even landing). Golovkin was chasing Canelo, yes, but it's kinda like how to mouse chased the trap... Golovkin took the majority of significant shots, while only walking around, jabbing and missing with his power punches. I hate that fat ginger as much as the next guy does, but fair is fair and he beat Golovkin.

Problem is man, everybody else also thinks they're being objective, and literally any point can be argued indefinitely without anyone being able to definitely prove who is right and wrong. What makes you more objective that the next guy other than your own sense of self-worth?

Ultimately fight judging is a subjective process, man, and as such there are many worse ways of deciding a winner than by a popular vote.

[Illmatic94]

in my opinion the worst robbery of all time is Brandon Rios vs Richard Abril. and the only judge to score correctly was Adalaide Byrd. lol. that fight screams corruption loud and clear. more blatant than Whitaker/Chavez, Lara/Williams, or all the fuss about GGG/Nelo. i have never ever seen such a blatant robbery in boxing. the only fight comparable is Roy Jones getting robbed in the Olympics.

after Abril/Rios eleven judges rewatched and scored the fight. all said Abril won. but the record remained the same.

thats a fight that really needed Teddy Atlas commentating for one of his classic tantrums. if Horn/Pacquiao made him almost pop a vein he would've killed somebody afrer Rios/Abril.

after the backlash Keith Kizer said judges wont face any punishment seeing according to him watching the fight live was different than TV. he said watching it live Rios was winning rounds. so if watching on TV means the correct decision then make the judges watch and score fight from a monitor.

no fight you can name in history is worst display of corruption than Rios/Abril. if you want to watch the fight ask for the link.

[Illmatic94]

it has nothing to do with judging. your question should be how do you stop corruption in boxing. you think its a coincidence 99 percent of the time the a-side guy gets favorable treatment and the judges suddenly become his biggest fan? its a system where they know either implicitly or explicitly to score for the a-side. why they do this is unknown: future fights, they want to get in their good graces, they think the other judges are scoring it for the a-side, etc....you think the judges suddenly started loving ward and decided to give him round 10 when he was dominated in that round? they know math better than you think and thats proof. oh no we cant spare one more round ok just give them all to ward even if he clearly lost them. they should have spaced out their bad scoring a little better but they can still do math

your theory falls apart because Ward was not the A side in the first fight with Kovalev. and Vegas is not his backyard. and from what I remember from round 10 Kovalev got his nose busted with a hook and started leaking. judges score blood believe it or not. this is part of the reason Mosley was given the win vs DLH in the rematch. Oscar was cut and bled from the eye. replay showed a headbutt but judges dont have the luxury of replay.

[Caught Square]

Nothing can be done imo, when you have rules that are interpretation based there's always a grey area and room for controversy.

Even complete robberies would be removed if there was a factual system of scoring but there isn't, there will always be a judge or 2 who has a bad night and gets it badly wrong and that's the reality.

It's not just boxing but in any sport with interpretation rules you can't get rid of the controversy. Goal line technology in football is great because it's a FACT there's no denying it, but even with this VAR( video assistant ref) certain moments like penalty calls are still based on interpretation and will cause divide on whether it was the right call.

[Morrie ATG]

The judges have to farthest seats on fight night. About 10 feet away give or take. They should be allowed to use binoculars

[redmish]

I would have 5 judges all sitting on the same side of the ring. That way they would all have a similar viewing angle.

[The Gambler1981]

Problem is man, everybody else also thinks they're being objective, and literally any point can be argued indefinitely without anyone being able to definitely prove who is right and wrong. What makes you more objective that the next guy other than your own sense of self-worth?

Ultimately fight judging is a subjective process, man, and as such there are many worse ways of deciding a winner than by a popular vote.

Your greater point is right and boxing judging is about qualitative judgement which are all open to interpretation. So it essentially doesn't matter because whatever you decide someone will disagree and still be "right".

I just can't get on board with a popular vote because it become a popularity contest, and having seen how fans vote for all star games that don't matter. I have no faith in a large group to pick anything important without strict regulations that are impossible for something like picking a boxing contest winner. Because for example how do you control who gets to vote, someone could not watch the fight and vote. A room of dudes from ****ladesh could be paid $5 to click on one dudes name over and over, and that wouldn't be sorted out until months later if ever.

So no popular vote is not a good idea at all, especially with money on the line, I need to see who is responsible and who can be held accountable if there was corruption of the process.

[_Rexy_]

it has nothing to do with judging. your question should be how do you stop corruption in boxing. you think its a coincidence 99 percent of the time the a-side guy gets favorable treatment and the judges suddenly become his biggest fan? its a system where they know either implicitly or explicitly to score for the a-side. why they do this is unknown: future fights, they want to get in their good graces, they think the other judges are scoring it for the a-side, etc....you think the judges suddenly started loving ward and decided to give him round 10 when he was dominated in that round? they know math better than you think and thats proof. oh no we cant spare one more round ok just give them all to ward even if he clearly lost them. they should have spaced out their bad scoring a little better but they can still do math

Careful now...there are thousands of boxing matches that we can debate, but for some reason when someone questions Ward vs Kovalev it turns into a race thing...

your theory falls apart because Ward was not the A side in the first fight with Kovalev. and Vegas is not his backyard. and from what I remember from round 10 Kovalev got his nose busted with a hook and started leaking. judges score blood believe it or not. this is part of the reason Mosley was given the win vs DLH in the rematch. Oscar was cut and bled from the eye. replay showed a headbutt but judges dont have the luxury of replay.

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that Vegas was more of Wards back yard than it was Kovalev's. Last I checked Cali was closer to Nevada than Russia. As for the A side, I thought that Ward was ranked #1 and Kov #2, but that may have been reversed and then switched after that fight.
I don't remember Kov getting his nose busted, but to be honest with you, I wasn't really as outraged over the first match as I was the second one. IIRC I had Kovalev up by a round or two in a close fight in the first match, but the second match was a series of nut shots, had no idea what the ref was doing calling it off.

[Banderivets]

Eliminate corruption and have a proper centralized body to certify judges, can be done easily. Say the sanctioning bodies won't allow judges to score fights until they are certified.

Certification process would have them go to training where they are taught by agreed upon guidelines how to judge a fight.

Every scorecard would have to be reviewed by this body and judges simply stripped of their rights if they misjudge a fight.

There should be no real room for interpretation. It should be clear to everyone how a fight will be scored, to the fighters, judges and fans.

Now these guidelines can change and should change, because some might begin to exploit the rules.

You cant have one judge reward aggression, and the next judge reward running all night and getting off a shot or two.

You need to look at each round in isolation and determine who inflicted more damage (damage can mean inflicted punches and making the opponent more tired...as in missing lots etc), at times it might be hard to say but you need to have scoring guidelines. What is more important? 3 hard blows or 6 medium (light shots?)

How should defense be rewarded? Making a an opponent miss a ton of shots should be rewarded. But if a fighter is in there with the sole purpose of not engaging and just slipping shots all day, that is not boxing either...

It's all a balancing act, and someone needs to teach these judges how to do that.

But ultimately, unless we are talking about a KO, the more active fighter, the fighter that landed more shots should win the fight. It might not always be fair, but you have to have rules in place.