Yves Lavigne > Big John / Herb Dean

[theincognito]

He is well aware in there

 

[One Inch Punch]

He is a good ref

 

[Skydome]

http://forums.sherdog.com/forums/members/yves-lavigne/

 

[KoreanZawmbie]

He definitely is, but i wouldn't put any ref past Big John.

Herb is shit. I'd honestly have Mazzagatti over him.

 

[trblesome1]

Go watch Matt Brown vs Pete Sell

 

[CSA08]

I've always thought Yves Lavigne and Tory Waugh were two very underrated referees in the sport. I think Big John is still the king of the hill, but he's going to remain there until he retires most likely. Experience gives referees the best education, and no one has more experience than McCarthy.

 

[Charlie Sheen]

Leon Roberts > BJM > the rest

 

[countswagula]

He has good nights and bad nights. To his credit, on his bad nights he tends to stop things early, which is a lot better than late.

 

[SocraticMethod]

Better than John, about on par with Herb.

 

[That209]

Leon Roberts > BJM > the rest

This. Leon Roberts is criminally underrated, he's the best ref in the business. I'm willing to bet that almost any other ref would have stopped Condit/Ellenberger in the 1st, Leon Roberts knew better.

Of course it's you, Charlie, who understands who the best ref is.

 

[Maladroit]

He fucked up in Anderson vs Sonnen II

 

[HIMBOB]

He is first tier roughly equal to Big John and Herb.


On a side note,
did everyone complain about the Rousey stoppagee where you guys were until you saw the replay?
Boos, Crys of bullshit, WTF, WTH, etc etc when he stopped it.

everyone saw the replay and then there was a general mumbling of "yeah ok"

 

[HIMBOB]

He has good nights and bad nights. To his credit, on his bad nights he tends to stop things early, which is a lot better than late.

Same with Herb, I think it best to err of that side.

 

[welcometohavoc]

Yamasaki>All of them

 

[97talon]

He has good nights and bad nights. To his credit, on his bad nights he tends to stop things early, which is a lot better than late.

This right here.

 

[Scuba]

this always changes after every event

 

[Overnoww]

Yves has had some pretty big slip ups in his time but recently he has been outstanding and overall I think he is a phenomenal referee and definitely one of the best.

But people turn on referees so fast. One mistake can entirely flip the fans perspective. Look at Herb, he was widely considered the best for a while and he had 3 fights that people thought he messed up in a short period of time (the only one I personally had an issue with was Barao-Faber 2, I thought Rousey-McMann was fine and the Pyle fight was late, but it was fine)

Personally my favourite was Rosenthal. He had that hella late stoppage in Weidman-Munoz right before he went to jail but I personally don't remember very many slips from him other than that. He almost never stopped fights early too.

 

[CRuck1980]

I would agree, if not got the Matt Brown/Pete Sell fight. That was the single worst ref job I've ever seen, yes even worse than Mazzagatti

 

[submiturass]

I like the entertainment value of a Kim Winslow refereed fight

 

[CSA08]

Yves has had some pretty big slip ups in his time but recently he has been outstanding and overall I think he is a phenomenal referee and definitely one of the best.

But people turn on referees so fast. One mistake can entirely flip the fans perspective. Look at Herb, he was widely considered the best for a while and he had 3 fights that people thought he messed up in a short period of time (the only one I personally had an issue with was Barao-Faber 2, I thought Rousey-McMann was fine and the Pyle fight was late, but it was fine)

Personally my favourite was Rosenthal. He had that hella late stoppage in Weidman-Munoz right before he went to jail but I personally don't remember very many slips from him other than that. He almost never stopped fights early too.

People have got to remember that referees are human, and these days with more fights getting more coverage there are more chances for referees to have mistakes on bigger stages than was the case in the 90s and early days of the 21st century.

I just wonder what many fans would think if they had seen Big John's infamous Sakuraba stoppage from Ultimate Japan? Would they turn on him had that happened at a time when more people were watching?