There are far too many flaws with the 10-point must system for MMA to continue relying on it for too much longer. It was co-opted from boxing when the sport was in its infancy and over the years, but we need to find a better method going forward.
That could be something as simple as moving from a 10-point system to scoring rounds out of 20 or using half-points, as both provide greater opportunity for variations in scoring, allowing officials to better highlight the slight differences between frames. Right now, the majority of rounds are scored 10-9, but looking at the Lawler-Condit fight from Saturday, you can see the problem with the over-reliance on that score.
Every round of that fight was scored 10-9 by every judge, but each frame was different. Lawler knocked Condit down in the second, but received the same score as Condit did in the first when he simply landed more strikes without putting Lawler on the canvas. In the fifth, the champion had the challenger on the ropes, covering up and trying to survive to the final bell, but all three judges still turned in 10-9 rounds in favour of Lawler, the same score they each submitted for the ultra-close third round that proved to be the deciding frame of the fight.
Personally, I like the idea of scoring rounds out of 20:
20-19 for rounds where one fighter holds a slight edge
20-18 for rounds where it’s clear who won the round, but there is nothing major that transpires
20-17 for rounds where a knockdown or clear “Fighter A is in danger” period occurs
20-16 for rounds where one fighter dominates the entire round and is close to finishing the fight
20-15 for rounds where you wouldn’t have complained if the referee stopped the fight
Using those scoring options, Lawler-Condit ends up as a draw for me (18-20, 20-18, 19-20, 18-20, 20-17 for 95-95) and that feels like a more accurate representation of what happened both in each individual round and the fight as a whole than 10-9s across the board for split 48-47 scores. Throughout the year, I’m going to try to run back at least one fight per week that ended with controversial/debated scorecards using this method to see how they would shake out, just to get a feel for if this system would be an improvement or not.
(Note: I know scoring is subjective so how everyone scores a particular round is different, but I think those that cover this sport for a living have a pretty good handle on scoring fights, for the most part.)