Let’s Get It On! (51 page)

I tried to bury these ominous thoughts and concentrate on what I could control: my own performance in the cage.

At UFC 71 “Liddell vs. Jackson” on May 26, 2007, at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas, it was my backstage routine that made the difference. That night, as always, I went over the basics with each fighter I’d be refereeing, and it was a good thing I did. Among the points, I said, “If you’re caught in a submission and scream out in pain, it’s the same as a tap, and the fight will be stopped.”

In his lightweight bout against Din Thomas, newcomer Jeremy Stephens was doing well until he got caught in a deep armbar submission. He tried working his way out and finally screamed as Thomas hyperextended his elbow joint.

I immediately stopped the fight, and the first words out of Stephens’ mouth were “I did not tap.”

When I reminded him of what we’d covered backstage, he deflated like a balloon.

I also officiated the headlining championship rematch between Chuck Liddell and Quinton “Rampage” Jackson that night, which had had one hell of a buildup for a bout that wouldn’t leave the first round. Liddell came in with a left hook to the body but left Jackson an opening to land a counter-right hook flush on his chin. The punch dropped Liddell, and Jackson went in for the kill, hitting the champion unconscious with one punch and back into consciousness with the next.

I had already moved in to stop the fight when I saw Liddell go out.

It was the first time Liddell had been whipped in three years, and it snapped the cool California fighter’s seven-fight win streak. Not coincidentally, the last fighter Liddell had lost to had been Jackson himself, who’d brutally taken the UFC fighter out in a 2004 Pride grand prix tournament in Japan.

The day after UFC 71, I received a call from John Hackleman, Liddell’s coach since before his start in MMA, who thanked me for protecting Liddell. He said he’d been climbing up on the apron to stop the fight when I’d done it. That was a phone call I very much appreciated.

For UFC 72 “Victory,” we traveled to Belfast, Northern Ireland, for the first time. Elaine came with me, as always, but this time there was no question about my plane ticket. I did what Dana had suggested and upgraded myself to business class for the trip. It hurt paying $1,000 for the upgrade, but in the air it was worth every penny.

My hectic schedule continued till something had to give. I’d given up coaching the local high school football team to referee more shows and open the gym. But each time I would add something to my life, something would have to fall to the wayside.

Elaine had wanted me to quit the police department for quite a while. I’d turned down a lot of opportunities in MMA already because I didn’t have the time. More opportunities for TV and movie appearances cropped up, and though I didn’t seek them out, I certainly didn’t mind the extra money to support my family.

The UFC had about thirty events a year now, and I’d eaten up all my personal and vacation time. Elaine reasoned that the sport had grown immensely in the last couple years, and between the gym, appearances, and requests from commissions for me to teach their officials, I could now make a living off of MMA. I know Elaine was also worried about the pace I was keeping; no one could keep it up forever.

My tolerance for some aspects of the LAPD and its politics had long been gone, but I’d always looked at the job as our safety net. If everything else went to hell, I’d still have a steady paycheck and medical insurance from the department. I also loved teaching new recruits, but the job was taking up about 70 percent of my life.

I wrestled with this decision for a while and eventually came to the decision that it was time to take another step in my life. Now, after twenty-two years of service, I’d say good-bye to the LAPD.

At the same time, I was falling under immense scrutiny in the fight community. I’d been working with athletic commissions since UFC 15, but I’d always felt like I was a part of the UFC and was obligated to them. In the sport’s early years, it hadn’t been a problem because there hadn’t been many promotions outside of the UFC to referee anyway. When Zuffa had taken over, they’d always given me the schedule months ahead so I could juggle my paid time off or vacations days.

When athletic commissions had begun to call to assign me to other promotions outside the UFC, sometimes on short notice, it would often conflict with my LAPD schedule. I couldn’t accept all of the assignments. Eventually, word got back to me that some commissions thought I was a prima donna who thought I was too good to work any show besides the UFC. Honestly, I would have loved to do the other events, but some of those other promotions had caused problems with the UFC and had basically become their enemy, and I didn’t want to do anything that caused a problem. Whatever I did, I was going to piss off either the UFC or the commissions. It was really a no-win situation.

If circumstances could have stayed the same, it would have been fine, but some commissions said if I didn’t work the other shows they asked me to, I wouldn’t be working the UFC when it came to their state. After hearing that, I felt it wouldn’t be long before the UFC told me they couldn’t bring me along at all.

I understood the commissions’ stance, and I didn’t blame the UFC either. Zuffa had been generous in coming up with a solution to keep me on when it had swooped in and purchased the UFC. It wasn’t anybody’s fault that the sport had evolved, changing my role, over the years.

As I did when faced with many of life’s big decisions, I went to my dad for advice.

“You’ve been loyal to them, and the UFC’s been loyal to you,” he said. “They don’t owe you anything, and you don’t owe them anything.”

Of all my reasons, politics was the biggest one that led me to retire from refereeing. I wasn’t leaving because I didn’t enjoy refereeing. I still loved it, but I was stuck. I was in a no-win situation and felt I couldn’t make everyone happy.

My dad gave me one last bit of advice. “Walk away from it but only if it’s what you want to do.”

I knew this wasn’t what I really wanted, but I felt I had no choice. Elaine quietly started to put out feelers to some media outlets to see if someone might want to use me as a commentator or an analyst. I never wanted to be a commentator; it was merely something I could do to stay involved with the sport I loved.

Meanwhile, the UFC, with no knowledge of my own inner struggle, continued to pump out shows to a widening audience. At UFC 75 “Champion vs. Champion” on September 8, 2007, at O2 Arena in London, England, I was reminded how human fighters really are, ironically by one of the most feared athletes in the sport.

Croatian striker Mirko “Cro Cop” Filipovic’s streak of brutal stoppages in Japan had conjured up words like “invincible” and “unbeatable.” That is, until Fedor Emelianenko exploited a chink in Filipovic’s armor when they met in Pride Fighting Championships in August of 2005. While everyone else did all they could to stay away from Filipovic’s now legendary left high kick, the sambo expert Emelianenko decided to not only stand with the former K-1 fighter but go after him and make him back up. This strategy gave Cro Cop fits, as he was never able to set his feet to kick and couldn’t gain a comfort zone moving backward.

Once a fighter uncovers a flaw or a weakness in another, other fighters are like swarming sharks quick to exploit the same.

By UFC 75 in 2007, Filipovic was losing his indestructible aura. Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belt Gabriel Gonzaga had knocked him out months before at UFC 70 by stunning him with his own left high kick.

Filipovic was in desperate need of a win, and the UFC matched him against French kickboxer Cheick Kongo to ensure a stand-up battle from two fighters who likely wouldn’t be looking for the takedown.

Though Kongo is one of the most physically imposing fighters in MMA with a body that could be used as an anatomy chart, he was hesitant to engage at the top of his bout with Filipovic. This is called giving respect to your opponent’s skills, and it had Kongo’s corner screaming at him to not back away. Slowly but surely, though, Kongo began to land powerful body blows that hurt Filipovic.

By the end of the first round, it was clear Kongo now believed what he wasn’t too sure of before the fight started: he belonged in the cage with Filipovic, and he could win. I watched Kongo’s confidence soar as he started to dictate the pace of the second round. Several times during the fight Kongo threw knees that Filipovic reacted to as if he’d been hit in the groin, but I paid close attention to where the shots landed and didn’t stop the action.

In the third round, as Kongo clinched with his opponent, he started throwing knees again, one of which hit Cro Cop low. I called time to allow Filipovic to recover from the low blow. He crouched on the fence.