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BIG JOHN McCARTHY The Octagon’s 9th Side
© Marc Wickert www.knucklepit.com Big John McCarthy is as much a part of UFC as the Octagon’s eight sides. Having been a mainstay with the mixed martial arts event since UFC II, the Los Angeles born referee is probably the most popular referee in any sport in the world: Which other ref receives a hero’s welcome from the crowd upon arriving at a match? John’s ‘day job’ is also quite unusual: He works as a tactical response instructor for the LAPD. McCarthy’s dad worked as a police officer for thirty years, so this line of work seemed like a natural thing for Big John to take on. And when John told his dad he’d been doing some martial arts, his dad told him it was ‘crap’, and suggested he get into free-style wrestling. Big John laughs off any suggestion he took up martial arts to discourage bullies: "I didn’t have any trouble with that sort of thing." McCarthy attended UFC I: The Beginning, and was approached by Royce Gracie’s older brother, fight director Rorian Gracie, to referee UFC II. "I was a sparring partner for Royce, and my wife was actually working at UFC I. After the fights, Rorian came up to me and said he wanted me to referee the next UFC." Big John McCarthy has been there ever since. At the time of UFC II, the tournament was being billed as "Banned in 49 states, The Ultimate Fighting Championship brings you combat at its most basic: courageous victory or crushing defeat! No gloves. No pads. No judges’ scores. No restrictions, rounds or rules! In this tournament, you don’t just fight to win, you fight to survive…" So John was only expected to stop the bouts if a competitor or his corner surrendered. Fortunately morality caused McCarthy to introduced some rules of his own. "It was a whole lot different to now. When I started in UFC II, there wasn’t much I was supposed to do: only stop a fight if a competitor tapped out or if his corner threw in the towel. That was the problem – a lot of guys were getting hurt pretty badly. They’d talk to their corner and say, ‘Don’t you throw in the towel.’ And then the ring doctor would ask the corner why they didn’t throw in the towel, so I ended up stopping fights. But I wasn’t supposed to. It was a hard decision, but I didn’t want to see guys getting hurt. Things had to change and they did." The duration of fights had to change through necessity also. Some bouts were going for 30 minutes, with the majority of the ‘action’ involving one competitor being in the mount and the other in the guard, the fight being a virtual stalemate. "Originally, there were supposed to be unlimited rounds of 5 minutes per round. Then after that, there were no rounds: no time limit at all. After UFC IV: Revenge of the Warriors, they had to start imposing time limits, because the fighters were getting better, and with pay per view television a finishing time was required or televising would be cut off before bouts ended." UFC VI: Clash of the Titans saw the dynamic debut of David Tank Abbott. In Tank’s first bout he KO’d 400 lb John Matua in just 21 seconds. Abbott’s second fight was against 300 lb Paul Varelans, and was stopped by referee McCarthy in 1.51, after Tank unmercifully unloaded huge punches to Varelans’s body and face. But Big John says he wasn’t particularly shocked by Tank’s ‘demolition derby’.
"I’ve been around enough people being knocked out. However, Dave had a different attitude: a little bit different to other people, but it all worked out well. He definitely made a statement, and I enjoyed it. Even in the last bout against Oleg Taktarov (17.45), you have to give him credit, because that was about 6,000 feet of elevation, and the air was a bit thinner. That was an unbelievably tough fight. That was David’s show. He did a really good job. I mean, he made a name for himself all in that one show." John McCarthy suggests a number of practitioners of arts claiming to be ‘the ultimate self defence system’, and containing secret, deadly techniques, have had to put up or shut up since the arrival of Ultimate Fighting Championship in 1993. "The UFC has done more to change the way people think of the martial arts in the last 10 years than probably the last 100 years before that. The UFC made people take notice of what truly worked in a fight. All of the flash and fancy movement wasn’t doing too well in real fights. "What happened was you had two distinctly different reactions by most martial artists: the first looked at the UFC and said to themselves, ‘I need to learn more than I know now to evolve’. They then went and learned ground fighting, or whatever they needed to make themselves better. "The second just brazenly boasted that nothing they saw in the UFC could be used against them, and that their techniques were not for fighting - they were for killing! It was all a bunch of crap. They knew that if they didn’t talk the UFC down they were going to be losing money, because students of theirs were going to be going somewhere else to learn what they were seeing on TV. I know of several instructors who were made to look rather foolish after allowing themselves to be tested by someone who finally called their bluff." John McCarthy is also sceptical of people who claim to be more interested in the higher, spiritual side of martial arts. "I never met a single person who stepped foot into a dojo and stated, ‘I am here because I want to become more spiritual’. "Just about everybody goes to a martial arts school to learn how to defend themselves better than they could before stepping into the school. That is what the martial arts is all about: ‘Self Defence’. You will hear a lot of people saying things about how the fighters you see in the UFC really don't belong in the martial arts, because they don’t have the spiritual side of the arts engrained in them. "Again this is just a bunch of horse crap being spouted off by some fool who realizes that what he teaches is not going to be able to help someone in a real fight, so he better take up the spiritual side. People go to church to be spiritually inspired or motivated. People go to martial arts dojos to learn how to fight!"
McCarthy says some fighters talk to each other during bouts and others never utter a word. "Some of them do and some of them don’t. You’ll hear all sorts of funny things in there, like a guy will say to his opponent, ‘Can you feel the end is coming?’ You’ll hear things all the time, but mostly they’re very respectful to one another." Big John recalls an incident in UFC V: Return of the Beast, in which Royce Gracie and Ken Shamrock faced each other in The Superfight. "Ken was fighting Royce and it went down to the ground, where they stayed for a long time. Ken was receiving instructions from his father Bob at the side of the Octagon, and it got to the point where Bob was so frustrated by the drawn-out battle, he says, ‘God damn it, Ken, why don’t you just kiss him? It’s friggin’ embarrassing.’ Ken looks at his father as though to say, ‘What the hell are you telling me?’ He turns back to Royce, and Royce says, ‘Please don’t do that’. I’m in the middle of it and I start laughing. I think, ‘Oh my God’. I’m sure you can see it on the video. Things like that happen all the time." John believes the level of fighters has changed dramatically since UFC’s inception, and says they are professional athletes today. Prior to a competition, competitors stay in the same hotel and show respect for each other as would be expected of true professionals. McCarthy suggests today’s fighter needs to be more widely skilled. " I would say you have to have the hand skills of a boxer: to be able to throw a good, straight punch and combinations, and to be able to block punches with your hands. You need to be able to kick like a Muay Thai, do takedowns like a wrestler, and be able to do jiu jitsu submissions." Big John says a person skilled only in Greco-Roman or freestyle wrestling is going to be able to take an opponent down, control body position, and possibly punch the other guy. But his ability to submit an opponent is limited. For these reasons, John believes today’s fighters have to be more cross-trained. Fighters display different attitudes when entering the Octagon: some try to intimidate their opponents, some look nervous, and others display confidence. However, Randy Couture looks completely at home in the Octagon. It’s not just his ability to adjust to any style that makes him ‘The Natural’. "Randy is relaxed because this is just all competition for him, and he lives for the competition. He thrives on it. Randy cannot wait to get into the ring, because it is just another chance for him to compete against another person. That is why you will see him with a big smile on his face, waiting for the fight to start. He is truly happy to be there. Yes, it is a fight to him, but he really loves it because of the competition." Despite some of UFC’s combatants being huge men by any standards, the fighters have never dwarfed Big John McCarthy. And the superfit tactical response instructor did consider competing in MMA at one time.
"You know what? At one time I thought I could do pretty well at it. And to be honest, knowing what I knew…But the fighters now are so much better than they were in the past. They are at a different level. It used to be that the style was winning the fight. Now everybody has good techniques and styles. It comes down to who is the best-conditioned athlete, who has the fast-twitch muscle fibre, the guy who can go longer and sustain that high rate. The guys now are so good compared to how they were in the past. I couldn’t compete today, and I’m smart enough to know what I’m meant to be doing." A former powerlifter, Big John does work hard to maintain his superb physique. He enjoys regular grappling and boxing workouts, lifts weights, rides his bikes and jogs. "I try to vary my training to keep it interesting," says McCarthy. When UFC debuted in 1993, the organization took out advertisements in fight magazines, asking martial artists if they were tough enough to compete in the Octagon. In 2003, it’s more a case of fighters having to come up through the ranks of smaller MMA events to qualify for a place on the UFC card. They have to establish credentials for this ‘by invitation only’ tournament. "In his UFC debut, Marvin Eastman didn’t have a good showing, but Vitor Belfort had a lot to do with that. I’m sure Marvin will be back. He’s a perfect example of a fighter coming up through the ranks. "Marvin fought his first fight in King of the
Cage, and he fought Quinton Jackson, another great fighter. It was an incredible
fight between two really skilled guys at the beginning of their careers. Marvin
and Quinton beat the hell out of each other. Marvin hit Quinton with 3 kicks to
the head that would have knocked out most guys, and Quinton took ’em and just
kept coming back for more. After the fight I told Quinton he was going to be a
great fighter in the future. Look at him now, he made me a pretty good
forecaster." For loyal fight fans watching each UFC tournament Live, it’s not just the Octagon’s warriors they love to see: it’s the celebrity stalwarts of UFC with whom they have developed a bond over the past decade. Men like Big John McCarthy, Mike Goldberg and Bruce Buffer: stars in their own right. "I absolutely love the sport. It’s enjoyable…Every time a show comes up, and I get to do it, I enjoy it and it’s fun. It’s like someone gives you a new toy." Even Big John couldn’t have imagined the line he is most famous for would become so big. " It’s become too big. When I’m in the UFC I have no problem with it. But I have people coming up all the time, asking me to say, ‘Let’s get it on!’ and I say, ‘No sorry, I can’t’." Has Big John ever been approached to say it for a condom commercial? "No. But I would do it for that."
UFC 44 UNDISPUTED MMA fans can watch out for Big John McCarthy in UFC 44: Undisputed on September 26, 2003 (Las Vegas time). On the card will be: Light Heavyweight Champion Tito Ortiz vs interim title-holder Randy Couture Heavyweight Champion Tim Sylvia (6’8", 265lb) vs Gan McGee (6’10", 265lb) Heavyweight ("Battle of Belarusi") Andre Arlovski vs Vladmir Matyuskenko Light Heavyweight Rich Franklin vs Edwin Dewees Middleweight Jorge Rivera vs David Loiseau Welterweight Dave Strasser vs Karo Parisyan Welterweight Jeremy Jackson vs Nick Diaz Lightweight Caol Uno vs Hermes Franca Lightweight Josh Thomson vs Gerald Strebendt AUSTRALIAN UFC FANS PLEASE NOTE UFC 44: Undisputed will be broadcast on PPV. Check with your pay TV provider for details.
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