“Why wasn’t the fight immediately called after the intentional foul?” “How come that wasn’t an automatic disqualification?” Two people, neither of whom could be considered hardcore MMA fans, asked me those questions separately this past weekend after they watched Petr Yan ’s egregious illegal knee against Aljamain Sterling at UFC 259. Since the moment Yan’s knee connected Saturday night, the prevailing notion on social media has been that Sterling “deserves an Oscar,” and that he milked it and ultimately quit. The fight ending in a disqualification and Sterling as the new champion? To MMA Twitter, that was his decision – which isn’t technically true, but the optics of how the situation unfolded made it seem that way. The hate being hurled at Sterling – the victim of an intentional and vicious illegal knee to the face, mind you – is completely irrational and unjustified. Which leads me back to those two questions and specifically how they were phrased: Why wasn’t the fight immediately called
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How the unified rules failed Aljamain Sterling at UFC 259 | Opinion – MMA Junkie