BTW..... no props for Gino Rodriguez? C'mon!

[AdamGB]

It wasn't repeated and you will get some leeway. If you're going at 100mph in a car you can't stop in a second.

[El Kabong]

Haye didn't slip man, he dropped to a knee on purpose each time Wlad leaned on him to try and get points deducted which worked.....once.

On one of those flops the ref should have red carded him

[generalbulldog]

For that fight, Haye was on his knees more than some sluts were in a porn movie.

[AdamGB]

Yeah, it got ridiculous towards the end.

[JazMerkin]

Because they weren't happening every 30 seconds. You don't take a point off for something like that unless it's done much worse or more frequently.

I guess I'd have to take a look at the rule book but I don't see why someone needs to violently and repeatedly punch someone after the bell more than once in order to get a points deduction

It often happens, because what the bell or what the referee is saying are not at the foremost focus of your mind. Even in sparring, the trainer might call time, but you don't immediately react to it if you're in flow with your punches. Haye carried on for maybe a second before he turned. I don't think Wlad thought of it as a big deal because he's probably done it himself. The ref will just watch out for if it gets repeated, which might lead them to believe that they're trying to gain an advantage.

[marbleheadmaui]

After about the fifth round I wondered iof there was a machanism by which the ref could penalize 13. He chose a GREAT one.

[Memphis]

He had two decisions to make, got one right, got the other half right.

[p4pking]

Yea I thought it was a very good call on both point deductions as well. Wlad definetly bends the rules by leaning on guys in the clinch because he has no infighting ability at all, was glad to see a ref finally make it cost him. Sadly after that Haye started crying wolf, and towards the ends of the fight he was bailing to his knees pre emptively, before Wlad even had a chance to really clinch him, which really stunk. I thought after the first deduction if he had just shown some more grit and tried to fight out of the clinch more often he probably could have baited Wlad into losing more points that way, and it certainly would have made for a better watch if he'd tried.

[Spicoli]

Refs dont get to make up the rules as they go. It gave us a warm and fuzzy but KD's are already mishandled bad enough. That is opening pandoras box.

[p4pking]

It's a fair point, but what is a ref to do in the case that a guy keeps flopping to his knees before a clinch even starts though? That in itself doesn't warrant a point deduction in the rules but it certainly should, and calling the KD really just equated to the same thing. How many fights is it really a regular occurance in anyways? I don't think it's a terrible precident to set at all.

[Memphis]

It's a fair point, but what is a ref to do in the case that a guy keeps flopping to his knees before a clinch even starts though? That in itself doesn't warrant a point deduction in the rules but it certainly should, and calling the KD really just equated to the same thing. How many fights is it really a regular occurance in anyways? I don't think it's a terrible precident to set at all.

I think calling a knockdown when there is no knockdown just because the guy has fucked you off is a dangerous precedent to set, even if it is quite funny.

[Hornfinger]

Haye didn't slip man, he dropped to a knee on purpose each time Wlad leaned on him to try and get points deducted which worked.....once.

On one of those flops the ref should have red carded him

It was a sensible tactic.

Wlad leaning on him and hugging him is not in the rules of boxing. Haye just took a knee each time wlad tried to infringe the rules.

why allow your opponant to cheat and at the same time drain your energy?

[p4pking]

It's a fair point, but what is a ref to do in the case that a guy keeps flopping to his knees before a clinch even starts though? That in itself doesn't warrant a point deduction in the rules but it certainly should, and calling the KD really just equated to the same thing. How many fights is it really a regular occurance in anyways? I don't think it's a terrible precident to set at all.

I think calling a knockdown when there is no knockdown just because the guy has fucked you off is a dangerous precedent to set, even if it is quite funny.

I understand really, I just can't really agree with that since it's so rare to actually see a fighter going down like that without taking punches or legitimately slipping. Was the standing 8 count in effect for this fight also? I imagine it wasn't or else that would have been a better call technically, but that's besides the point. Haye was deliberately throwing himself to the canvas repeatedly towards the end of that fight, I think it had to cost him somehow, he had been warned repeatedly. It wasn't just the ref he was fucking about with, Haye was really spoiling any potential action and making it a shit fight to watch from about the halfway point. All this would really do is discourage fighters from using such theatrics in the future. And obviously it was really funny.

[Majesty]

We (myself included) are only too quick to dump on a ref when he screws up. But how about Gino Rodriguez last night? I thought he did a remarkable job. I thought the point he deducted from Wlad in Round 7 was dead on. Wlad WAS pulling Haye down behind the head, and Gino had warned Wlad on repeated occasions. But THEN.... when it became obvious that it was more Haye's flopping than Wlad's pulling, Gino turned his attention on HIM.

Here again, he warned Haye on numerous occasions. "Quit doing that!" And to everyone's surprise (including Merchant and company), and my delight..... he counted a flop in Round 11 as a knockdown!! Genius. Some Haye fans may have said, "That was a questionable knockdown". Hell.... it wasn't even a knockdown. But if you're going to throw yourself on the ground like that, then take the 8-count. That made Haye fight more than anything Wlad did.

So props to the ref on this one.

No props to the ref whatsoever.

IF you are going to call going down a knockdown, you don't pick the one that looks the most obvious like Wladimir pushed him down.

The one prior to that when Haye went down because Wladimir barely touched him was one to take a point in, but not one where Wladimir pulls him in and dumps him down all that does is encourage it more if you already got the ref on your side in that situation. Haye flopped the one where Wladimir touched him, but Haye shouldn't lose a point in a situation he was actually guided by Wladimir's hand. Even when they played it on instant replay and made Roy Jones look like an idiot by saying "see here the flop..well Wladimir was pulling him in a little bit..but still.." Yeah.. that's why no one else said anything.

So the ref taking a point away on THAT particular one was bad form. I hate seeing refs trying to implement themselves too much into a fight and I would have been fine with counting going down as a knockdown had Haye kept doing it when Wladimir barely touched him, but calling it in a situation where it actually looked like Wladimir pulled him down is bad on the ref's part. So no kudos for that.

[Spicoli]

It's a fair point, but what is a ref to do in the case that a guy keeps flopping to his knees before a clinch even starts though? That in itself doesn't warrant a point deduction in the rules but it certainly should, and calling the KD really just equated to the same thing. How many fights is it really a regular occurance in anyways? I don't think it's a terrible precident to set at all.

There is just way to much there to be massaged and when ref rules with his emotion and not head it gets dicey. The commissions and governing bodies heads are leary enough without the ones they appoint to enforce the rules turning rouge.

He essentially in a round about way deducted a point out of frustration for something he had already acknowledged was of Wlads doing really, even though Haye was going down more than a ugly drunken best friend of a prom queen after prom.