Let's Get It On!_ The Making of MMA and Its Ultimate Referee - Big John Mccarthy [71]
The promotion had also continued its great referee experiment at UFC 6. Ron Van Clief, the fifty-one-year-old competitor from UFC 4, had found his way back into the UFC as its first and only commissioner, and he’d brought with him Taimak, of The Last Dragon fame, to referee. The twentysomething Taimak was nice enough, but he didn’t really have the constitution for this job. Taimak officiated the preliminary bouts for UFC 6 and 7, and by the latter I think he’d seen enough when alternate Joel Sutton reached into a half-inch cut on opponent Geza Kalman’s forehead and ripped it open another good three inches. That was Taimak’s last trip to the Octagon.
As for Commissioner Van Clief, he began to talk to Meyrowitz about instituting additional rules. Banning throat attacks was a big one for him; he called them a killing technique. Van Clief gave his notes to Meyrowitz, and Meyrowitz came to me with them. We agreed the rule wasn’t necessary at the time, because none of the fighters were utilizing that type of attack. Van Clief lasted for two shows as well.
The UFC’s oldest competitor, Ron Van Clief, with commentator Jim Brown and his date
A rule we did add at this time came following the Abbott-Taktarov bout. I credit my dad with this one, because he’d taught me that what we were seeing was called fish-hooking. Years before, my dad had gotten into a fight at Dodger Stadium with a man who’d started attacking people with a box cutter. After he sliced my dad’s friend across the neck and back, my dad grabbed him, picked him up, and slammed him headfirst into the seats. Then he got ahold of his mouth and fish-hooked him, splitting his face all the way up to his eye. Describing this story to Meyrowitz proved an easy way to get “no fish-hooking” added to our growing rules list.
A bright spot for UFC 6 and 7—the latter of which was held on September 8, 1995, at the Buffalo Memorial Auditorium in Buffalo, New York—was the appearance of famed boxing announcer Michael Buffer as MC for the events. Buffer was a classy guy and the best announcer, and being the avid boxing fan that I was, I thought it was a big step up for the promotion. Michael Buffer shared the Octagon with me until WCW, a pro wrestling promotion that Buffer had already been announcing for, told him he’d have to choose between the two. I don’t think the money was even close, so Buffer, too, bid farewell to the Octagon.
Another man to make an appearance at UFC 7 was cageside physician Richard Istrico, who would stay on all the way through to UFC 30. Dr. Joe Estwanik, the previous cageside physician who’d also worked with the United States Olympic boxing team, had recommended Dr. Istrico to SEG. Meyrowitz liked that he came from New York, where SEG’s offices were located.
Dr. Istrico jumped right in and would send the fighters out for a host of exams like CAT scans, MRIs, and stress tests. He even asked me to start getting physicals because, as he put it, “You’re in there the most out of everybody,” and he had no qualms telling a fighter he couldn’t compete in the UFC if his medicals weren’t up to snuff.
The view you might get from where I stand: Mark Hall vs. Harold Howard at UFC 7 “Brawl in Buffalo” (September 1995)
Though UFC 7 boasted the promotion’s largest live audience to date, objections to the event were mounting. Arizona Senator John McCain, future United States presidential candidate, became the face of the anti-UFC movement when he drafted letters and sent them to the governors of every single state. Ironically, one of the first to jump on McCain’s bandwagon was Senator Ben Nighthorse Campbell, who’d captained the United States judo team in the 1964 Olympic Games in Tokyo. Campbell pledged never to allow the UFC back into his state of Colorado after it hosted Ultimate Ultimate