Judge Cecil Peoples says: “If you don’t like it, you can go to hell”

Under fire MMA judge, Cecil Peoples has hit back at the MMA world who have criticised the decision this past Saturday night to award the UFC 104 main event fight to Lyoto Machida saying, “If you don’t like it, you can go to hell”.

Speaking to MMAWeekly.com, Peoples said:

“The fans and all the naysayers, I don’t worry about. I don’t back down because it’s not popular. My thing is, Rua did hit him more. But Machida hit him harder, especially in the early rounds.”

“I’m really perplexed about how you give (Rua) this round (the first), because Shogun was kicking (Machida) a lot in the legs, but every time he kicked him in the legs, he got hit in the face. Shogun would put his hand up, and Machida would go right through, sweat’s flying off (Rua’s) face. Shogun kicked (Machida) in the belly – that’s how he got the red mark.

“But you gotta remember, Machida is stepping back, so when he gets kicked, he’s getting brushed. But he counters Shogun with a hard kick to the belly. Which one counts more for the exchange? I give it to the (second one), because it was harder. It wasn’t brushed.”

“Machida was controlling that round because he was dominant in not getting beat up in that round,” he said. “He was the general in that first round.”

Peoples then went on to talk about the amount of fans who had disagreed with his and the other judges decision to award the fight to Machida and scorned:

“So you in a bar with 200 people that are sloppy drunk, and you’re gonna argue with me about the decision?” he asked. “How does that work? Only in America. I give the fight to Machida in a very, very close fight. Now you’re pissed off because it’s my fault that you lost your money. No, it’s not. It’s Machida’s fault.”

“If you don’t like it, you can go to hell.”

A rematch between the two Brazilian’s seems to be the most logical step for the promotion, especially considering they are a little thin on the ground for challengers at the moment.After the backlash across the MMA forums it would certainly be a brave athletic commission who appoints Mr. Peoples to judge on the second fight, although we must remember he wasn’t the only one scoring that night.

By Michael Pepper. (Follow me on Twitter)

 

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