Referee Jason Herzog had to answer for his bizarre performance at UFC Abu Dhabi after allowing a record-breaking beating go on for much longer than needed.
Steven Nguyen scored a stunning six official knockdowns, and two more that weren’t officially marked, on Mohammad Yahya during a UFC Abu Dhabi prelim bout. However, Herzog refused to stop the fight, and needed a doctor to call it off between rounds due to massive swelling on Yahya’s eye.
Viewers were disgusted by the referee’s refusal to call a stop to the contest, with many calling for him to be fired from his long-time role. And while that isn’t likely to happen, he did have to answer to Andy Foster from the California State Athletic Commission, who wasn’t even sanctioning the bout.
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UFC Abu Dhabi referee had to answer to top commission boss
Jason Herzog’s performance during that UFC Abu Dhabi fight was so concerning that California State Athletic Commission boss Andy Foster reached out to discuss it with him. The pair talked it out, and Herzog is expected to continue refereeing at the top level across jurisdictions.
“Jason Herzog is one of the best referees in the world so it’s a little bit of a difficult conversation,” Foster told Ariel Helwani on his show Tuesday. “Look, I have to have those kinds of conversations with anybody even if it’s Jason Herzog or whoever.
“The hope is he can learn from this and not let it happen again. I understand it’s rough on Jason right now but hopefully every referee in the country and the world will learn from this and not let this happen, I think six knockdowns is a little bit more than [necessary].
“Obviously it’s the quality of the knockdown and whatever, but if you talk about boxing, we do 10-6 [scorecards] but it doesn’t work out that often. They’re a little bit different sports and more knockdowns occur but four, five and six were pretty significant knockdowns and I would argue that with anyone.
“I think that [Herzog] has looked at the fight and he understands moving forward what he has to do. I have total confidence in Jason Herzog moving forward, he’s on an upcoming fight in California and I think any time you do this many fights, you can make mistakes from time to time.
“I have total confidence in him and we’re going to continue to utilize him. I don’t believe Jason will make this mistake in the future and I don’t think other referees will make this mistake in future.”
Fans wanted UFC Abu Dhabi referee fired after his performance
There was outrage on social media after the fight, particularly when images emerged of Yahya’s face which was luckily just swelling and not serious damage to his orbital bone. Fans wanted Herzog to be cut from refereeing altogether, which now seems unlikely.
“The referee has to be held accountable for this, he should have stopped the fight in round one,” one fan wrote on X. “Get Jason Herzog out of the sport. He is clueless. Went from the best ref into the absolute worst of the worst,” another added.
UFC officials also had conversations with Herzog after the fact, with executive Dave Shaw telling the media: “We talked to Herzog after and he was commenting that there were moments in the fight where Yahya looked like he was right back in it.
“So he’d get knocked down, he’d get knocked down quickly, I think there were maybe five in the first round, maybe two more in the second and then I think how rapidly his eye changed and got swollen.
“I mean, what do I think? I think definitely there was a solid argument that the fight could’ve been called earlier but (Herzog) provided his justification and it seemed fine to me.”