The controversy started on day one of IBJJF Worlds. At the center of the first drama were an Andre Galvao blue belt student and an attempted kneebar who earned the DQ.
One spectators summed up what he’s seen:
I just watched a ref stop a match in the Blue belt division due to a knee bar dq. In the refs mind he called it a DQ and got the competitor’s to line up to award the win to the other competitor. Before he made the call he left the mats to talk to Galvao who was the coach of the student that got DQ. An agreement took place in their native language. Then the ref called the head ref over. The head ref, the ref, and Galvao talked for a few minutes then the ref went on the mats and gave the win to Galvao s student.
This is everything that is wrong with this place. If that was my student the ref would have made the call and walked off the mats. But because it’s Galvao…..
The whole crowd started booing. Pathetic.
But is it really all so simple?
The competition footage was sadly stricken by overzealous flosports censors from youtube but we checked out a recording on their site. The suspicious kneebar was between Gavin Corbe of Coastal jiu jitsu and Kenneth Espinosa of Atos.
Now while the witness account from above might have an axe to grind the Rule book paints quite a different picture. According to reddit user TwoNaGe:
It’s unfortunate but the ref actually got this one right:
According to the Authority of Referee subsection 1.1.3 under ARTICLE 1 – REFEREEING of the rules (page 4) which states:
The ruling on the result of a match may only be changed under the following circumstances:
• If the athlete has been disqualified erroneously for using a legitimate hold. In this case, if the match was interrupted and the athlete disqualified prior to the athlete under attack tapping out, the match shall be restarted at the center of the match area and the attacking athlete shall be awarded two points. In the event that the athlete under attack should tap out prior to the interruption and disqualification, the athlete performing the hold shall be declared the winner.
If you watch the video in slow motions at 3:47 Gavin Corbe clearly taps with his left hand on Demain’s left leg to a legal 50/50 transition movement. Originally, the ref motions at 4:05 to Galvao that his student pulled back on the ankle while thrusting his pelvis forward claiming it was an illegal kneebar submission attempt. I am not sure what they discussed, but if you rewatch the video you can see that Damain had his legs open and did not thrust his hips forward so it was infact a legal move, and the ref made the correct change in his ruling.
Tom DeBlass had an equally unpleasant experience with the same referee a few years back:
Same ref that gave the match to the other kid yesterday in the world’s after he dq’d him. Here he was reffing my match against Comprido a few years ago, he says go, I pass the guard, Comprido complains (which should be an automatic DQ talking to the ref) and the ref restarts us in a totally different position than we were in. You can hear Garry Lee Tonon yelling ,”what do you mean stop?!” The following day the ref and Comprido were laughing and joking together, great to see friends have one anothers back
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What do you think?
