“Big” John McCarthy will retire after TUF 6 Finale
Is Kevin Iole spoiling “Big” John’s moment?
LAS VEGAS — The best known referee in mixed martial arts will step down after Saturday’s UFC card at the Palms Hotel.
“Big” John McCarthy, who has been a referee since UFC 2 in 1994, will work the main event of The Ultimate Fighter finale on Saturday between Roger Huerta and Clay Guida and then announce his retirement.
McCarthy, 45, will take a job as an MMA analyst with The Fight Network.
I think we all knew this was probably the reason for the big announcement from The Fight Network on Friday, but jeez, can’t you let the man have his moment?
It will be sad to see McCarthy go. He’s truly the only person left from the old days of the UFC and has refereed some of the greatest fights in mixed martial arts history. I was hoping he’d be the referee for Wanderlei Silva vs. Chuck Liddell, as it seems only fitting that we see “Big” John tell these two legendary fighters to “get it on,” after all these years of waiting. Alas, that seems as if it will not be.
It’s sad to see ya go, “Big” John McCarthy, but good luck in your future endeavors.
Adam Morgan is
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thanks for the memories big john. too bad he had to go out after a crap season of TUF. at least huerta-guida looks like it’ll be a barn-burner…
i’ll miss big john in the cage tho! how long does herb the predator have left?
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So now you’re getting on Iole’s case for reporting news …
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I’m getting on Iole’s case for spoiling McCarthy’s announcement. TFN has gone to great lengths to publicize this big announcement and Iole just deflated it. It’s rude.
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Right, because the Fight Network has never released news that others didn’t want released at the time. What comes around …
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I too would like to see him ref UFC 79 but then again he has said that Tyson Griffin and Clay Guida was his favourite ever fight so it could just be fitting for him?
It will be sad to see him go especially with the caibre of other refs right now. The Pornstar’s alright, but Herb and Mario are questionable and I can’t forget when Yves Lavigne stood those guys up when one of em almost had a kimura locked.
Its fine to speculate that he was retiring, but don’t go out and add details. Couldn’t he just have held off so that as you say Adam, he can have his moment.
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I find the timing of this kind of interesting. The UFC is looking for a new ambassador and I don’t think you could find a better candidate then BJM (other than Randy, of course). Kind of get the feeling he is retiring so he can take a position with the UFC (or maybe another company?) in addition to the Fight Network job.
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“Right, because the Fight Network has never released news that others didn’t want released at the time. What comes around …”
it’s “what goes around…”
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BJM will be back in the ring elsewhere…
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will be missed for sure…he has the history and that great line….”lets get in on!”
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Adam, welcome to a thing called journalism. It’s a wonderful place where the goal is to break news as quickly as possible. Do you hop on ESPN or any other news source when they talk about the retirement of anyone in sports? Same thing.
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Its just a courtesy issue. That is all we are saying.
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