UFC Bantamweight Champion Julianna Pena Destroys Judges for ‘Ruining People’s Lives’ After Coaching ‘The Ultimate Fighter’
Openly vocal UFC bantamweight champion Julianna Pena spoke to ‘The Schmo’ and commented on the much-debated issue of judging in MMA. ‘The Venezuelan Vixen’ went off on the judges following her stint as a coach on ‘The Ultimate Fighter’, where she was placed opposite Amanda Nunes as the flagship coach of the season.
Julianna Pena didn’t mince her words when talking about the judging and it’s evident that she thinks something needs to be done about the way judges operate in MMA. Pena opined that judges are ruining the lives of upstart fighters who are trying to make a massive splash in MMA.
Julianna Peña and Amanda Nunes deliberate with Dana White on who should face each other in the #TUF30 semifinals 👀
Find out which fights are selected on Ep. 8, streaming now on @ESPNPlus ▶️ https://t.co/Irzu9QkuEI pic.twitter.com/f27EdUIbjM
— ESPN MMA (@espnmma) June 23, 2022
Given the way some fights are scored, there certainly seems to be some merit to her statement.
“Honestly, these fights are nuts. You see what these judges are doing to these fighters? It’s horrible.”
“These judges are ruining peoples’ lives and I have one last thing to say on that on this for last week’s episode and this week’s episode, real MMA fights are three rounds, not two rounds so it deserves to go to a third round in my opinion but that’s just me.”
Additionally, Julianna Pena was asked about open scoring as a concept that could possibly be introduced into MMA. Pena was open to the idea and she wanted the fighters on TUF to go all three rounds in order to get a holistic picture of the way a fight has played out.
“It should absolutely be open for discussion but the other thing that should be open for discussion is quit with these free exhibition matches on The Ultimate Fighter. They should be going three rounds no matter.” [h/t middleeasy.com]
Julianna Pena rematches Amanda Nunes after shocking the world with her gutsy performance at UFC 269. The highly anticipated rematch goes down at UFC 277 in Dallas and will give Pena an opportunity to prove to the MMA world that her first outing was a legitimate effort to dethrone the GOAT and assume control over one of the most historically significant divisions in the history of the organization.
