This is a manuscript of my short speech made at the officials seminar of the WBC convention in Dubrovnik, Croatia. Yours truly asked for opinions of highly respectable referees and judges attending there on my proposal.
Boxing depends on democracy. Without winning more than two votes out of the three judges, you cannot win a decision. If two judges see a fight even, it becomes a majority draw. Boxing stands on the majority system of democracy.
I would like to mention a case that the referee should make an obvious mistake, for example, in declaring a slip knockdown or calling a knockdown slip, and then the three judges currently have to accept the referee’s wrong call. In a world title bout each boxer has 120 points, 10 points multiplied by 12 rounds, at the beginning of the fight under the ten-point must system. Should all the judges be forced to accept the referee’s wrong decision on a knockdown or a slip, six points (three times 10-8) may move in a wrong way, which may wrongly affect the final result on which the winner is.
How about my idea? If the referee should obviously make a mistake because of his standing position or a blind angle, the judges shall have freedom and flexibility to refuse accepting his wrong call and score according to their own views. If so, you need not tally 10-8 automatically provided that you definitely see it differently. You may score 10-9 or 9-10 by correcting the referee’s wrong call.
Back to the democracy in boxing, why do we have three judges? It is because even if a judge should make a mistake in scoring a certain round, the other two judges may cover it by scoring rightly. Out of the four-man panel of a referee and three judges, if the third man should make an obvious mistake, the judges might correct his mistake by scoring at their discretion. I suppose this is the democracy. That is the way to compensate the referee’s mistake with the judges’ own views. It will improve the official verdict more properly. I would be my pleasure to listen to your opinion to my humble proposal.
Remarks:
This proposal could not get positive approval of the attendants. Some official expressed his opinion, as follows: If the judges may be given the authority to score against the referee’s decision in the ring, it may produce great confusion in such cases as the referee’s penalization on a boxer’s foul and other decisions on the processing of the fight. It may surely make sense.
My proposal was only limited to the referee’s call on whether it was a legal knockdown or a slip. I then suggested a way to decrease the referee’s mistakes in a following way. Before the fight, the referee shall ask for a possible assistance of the judges in case that the referee should encounter a situation that he might not be able to see whether to call a knockdown or a slip due to his standing position. The referee shall momentarily look at a judge close to him, who will quickly give the referee a signal of his view on a knockdown or a slip. Taking it into account, the referee may make a call of a knockdown or a slip. The referee need not pick up the count from the timekeeper at two or three so quickly but at five or six after momentarily watching the judge’s suggestion on it, if necessary.
Mr. Omar Garcia, a referee and the son of the legendary Mexican fighter Gasper Ortega, supported this idea by quoting examples in baseball of a cooperation by base umpires in making or correcting a decision. Mr. Marty Denkin, a Hall of Fame referee, suggested a difficulty in watching a judge’s signal in such a case due to a flow of the game.
For your reference, there recently happened a very unique incident in Tokyo, Japan, on October 2. In a Japanese national super-bantam title bout, defending champ Daisuke Yamanaka floored world #5 ranked challenger Shoji Kimura with a looping left hook in the second round. It was certainly blocked by Kimura’s right guard, but Kimura fell backward, losing his balance. The referee, however, took a mandatory eight count.
Just after the second session was over, the Japan Boxing Commission (JBC) promptly collected all the judges’ opinions and announced it wasn’t a knockdown but a slip?during the recess. This reporter got shocked to see this revolutionary correction of the referee’s wrong call. Can you do it in the US or UK? It might be possible Only In Japan. It might have something to do with the absoluteness of the referee’s authority in respective countries. The said correction of the referee’s mistake in Japan may become a reference to our future discussion. To err is human, to forgive divine.