The open-finger gloves used in the UFC have their advantages, the biggest advantage is allowing fighters the freedom of movement to grapple properly. When you compare the Pride glove to the UFC glove in this image that’s been making the rounds over the past week or so, there’s been a lot of debate about which style of gloves are better and safer.
- Some people say that either way the fingers are exposed, so it doesn’t make a difference.
- Other people argue that the way the pride gloves curve makes it harder to accidentally poke someone in the eye.
- The thumbs are essentially the same on both types of gloves, and a lot of pokes happen because the puncher has their thumb sticking out.
At the end of the day, we’ve seen countless UFC fights and entire cards riddled with eye pokes and it’s never a good time, but think back to the big Pride events – sure eye pokes happened, but doesn’t it seem like they didn’t happen nearly as often as they do in the UFC? This problem has been acknowledged by literally everyone who has anything to do with MMA at all, including Dana White who said “Keep your fucking fingers closed, man. The eye poke is the most dangerous thing that can happen out there.”
Bellator CEO Offers Help
In light of UFC 172 (Jones vs Glover), the eye poke issue has been getting a lot of attention once again. Whenever there’s a hot topic, you can guarantee that Bellator CEO Bjorn Rebney is going to get himself some press out of it, most recently by announcing that he has new and improved glove technology and he’s willing to share it with the UFC. This is a brilliant move by Bjorn. If the UFC wants better gloves, they’ll have to eat crow and accept them from Bellator. If (and this is the most likely case) the UFC turns down Rebney’s offer, they’ll look like they aren’t doing everything they can to protect the fighters. Either way, point goes to Bellator. The misconception here, however, is people assuming (due to the timing of this announcement) that these gloves are meant to reduce eye pokes, but in reality they’re meant to prevent injuries such as broken hands. None the less, Bjorn’s done a great job of inserting his organization into the discussion.
What The Pros Have To Say About It…
This isn’t a new issue at all, everyone’s had something to say about it over the years. Here are some notable quotes from MMA professionals because let’s face it – their opinions count for more than reporters or fans.
At the post fight media scrum for UFC 166, Dana White said the following, “We’re working on it, what are you gonna do? That’s not an easy fix. How do you make a glove that you can grapple in, and not poke people in the eye?” (The classic Dana White “What are you gonna do?” but he has a fair point. I guess it all depends what this mythical Bellator gloves can do for the UFC, if they figured out something the UFC hasn’t been able to this could be a game-changer.)
Here’s Rogan’s take on it… “What I was thinking was a thin leather cover for the 4 fingers with some elastic on the sides so that it could spread out a bit to adjust grip,” Rogan stated. “I don’t think it would hinder grappling too much if done properly, and it might even help because it would provide traction when gripping that bare sweaty fingers wouldn’t” (But you will be hard-pressed to find a grappler who’s in favor of any kind of finger-obstruction, they’ll tell you it’s hard enough already.)
The lead writer over at Bleacher Report received some statistics on eye pokes via FightMetric, and had the following to say (from this article), “While they don’t have complete data, they did find 32 eye pokes (that led to a pause in the action) from a sample of 1333 fights, and Rami estimated you’re likely to see an eye poke in 3-4% of UFC fights. Taken at the high end, you’re likely to see an eye poke once every 25 fights or so. Yet, conservatively, 96% of all fights transpire devoid of eye pokes. To add perspective, Rami estimated that groin shots are twice as common as eye pokes.”
Using The Eyepoke As a Weapon
Eye pokes happen, they’re part of the sport and for most fighters just “the cost of doing business”. Sometimes you’ll take an accidental poke, sometimes you’ll give one, but in general if you’re being careful this shouldn’t happen all that often. None the less, with the fact that fighters will almost always get at least a warning or two, and having an opponent with impaired vision is a huge advantage, there are certain guys who seem to use this foul more often than others. For example…
Michael Bisping isn’t known as the cleanest fighter, and he definitely didn’t win fans when he avoided putting himself on a 3-fight losing streak by getting a Technical Decision win over Alan Belcher at UFC 153 after Belcher was unable to continue due to a nasty eye-poke from The Count. In the post-fight presser, Bisping said that it was just Belcher looking for an easy way out which is a pretty obnoxious thing to say after beating your opponent with eye pokes. If you’re infuriated, enjoy this gif of Bisping getting knocked out by Hendo and Vitor at the same time.
Jon Jones takes advantage of his reach by keeping an arm extended out front, kind of like in the movie Spaceballs (see below..). Inevitably, when you hold your arm out infront of you with your fingers in line with your opponent’s eyes, preventing them from advancing – every now and then (or nearly every fight) you’re going to end up poking their eyes.
Josh Koscheck completes the trifecta of fighters who are notorious for eye pokes. Something else that they all have in common is that they don’t all necessarily click with fans, to put it lightly. Jon Jones has plenty of haters, but he also has a ton of fans due to his undeniable talent and skills inside the octagon. The other two guys are among the most disliked fighters in the UFC. Eye pokes might help you edge out a win, but they won’t win you any fans in the process.
Here’s a CRAZY idea…
If you want to get rid of “accidental” eye pokes in MMA, get rid of accidental eye pokes. Treat all eye pokes the same. If the ref catches you, you lose a point, no warnings. It’s your responsibility to keep your fingers and thumbs out of your opponents eye. You would see guys shape up really quickly and all those “accidentally” eye pokes would start to disappear in a hurry. Joe Rogan, Mike Goldberg and other voices of the UFC would have you think that it’s an inherent problem with the gloves but gloves don’t poke people in the eyes, people poke people in the eyes. As it stands, you’re almost guaranteed to get away with at least one or two accidentally pokes before the threat of losing a point comes in, and that’s all it takes to drastically sway the direction of a fight and to gain a massive advantage over your opponents so fighters are incentivized to poke each other in the eyes or at least to not try too hard to avoid it. Start penalizing every single eye poke and if this really is an equipment problem, you can guarantee they’ll come up with a solution really quick. On the other hand, there might be problems with fighters playing up an eye poke but it’s no different than it is now – if the ref sees it and stops the action, take off a point. Keep the gloves the same.
What do you guys think, is this too drastic of a solution?
Leave a comment below and share your thoughts.
Page 1 of 1:
