There was once a time when there were no rules in the UFC. In its early days in the early and mid-90s, the UFC was a tournament. There were no weight classes, no rounds, no time limits, no judges, and yes, no rules; except for no eye gouging, biting, or low blows. In these Wild West days, one of the earliest stars in the pre-Dana White and Zuffa days of the promotion was Tank Abbott.

With his bar brawler fighting style and kill-or-be-killed approach to his bouts, the California native made a name for himself among UFC fans. However, he never managed to become a champion. For which he holds one man responsible more than anyone else: legendary referee ‘Big’ John McCarthy. In his recent appearance on the ‘Joe Rogan Experience podcast, Abbott explained why, which prompted Rogan to call for a rule change.

Joe Rogan and Tank Abbott agree ‘Big John’ made the wrong call

Tank Abbott felt he was done dirty by ‘Big John’ at UFC 6. The UFC then was a tournament, with fighters needing to fight multiple opponents on the same night in a no-holds-barred fight. And on UFC 6, according to Abbott, “I believe I could have beat any man on Earth on that day” as “I was in my prime that day.” He reached the finals, after defeating John Matua and Paul Varelans via KO in the quarter and semi-finals, respectively.

However, the former street fighter suffered a submission loss to Oleg Taktarov in the 17th minute of their final clash. And according to Abbott, this was all courtesy of poor refereeing. During the fight, around the two-and-a-half-minute mark, the fight went to the ground, where it would remain for the next almost fifteen minutes. After this, John McCarthy, the referee for the fight, decided to break up the action and have the fighters stand up and reset.

This, according to Abbott, was “The only reason why I lost. Because of Big John McCarthy and his breaking up the fights. He should have never broke that fight up.” This puzzled Joe Rogan, who felt that since there was no rule to break up fighters if there was a lull in action on the ground, this was the wrong move on McCarthy’s part.

In addition, the JRE host reiterated his opposition to the current rule, mandating referees stand-up fighters, as he felt it was something that wouldn’t happen in a real fight, which is what the UFC (at least originally) purported to emulate.

“So there was no rule at all about standing people up [at that time]. I personally believe and I’ve broken this down too many times to repeat it, but I’m going to anyway. I don’t think they should ever stand people up. I think a person could take you down and keep you down. Tough sh**. Even if it’s boring like the whole idea is like what’s real,” Rogan said. However, this was not the only time Abbott felt the storied MMA referee had seriously erred.

Abbott gives another example of McCarthy breaking up fight despite the rules

The UFC legend referenced another fight, a clash between Bas Rutten and Kevin Randleman, which he alleged was bungled by ‘Big John’. Tank Abbott claimed that UFC’s first referee had made a similar blunder, standing up to Kevin Randleman during the UFC 20 clash in 1999, despite the aforementioned stand-up rule not having been promulgated yet.

“Take it from me about McCarthy affecting fights, the first fight they had… I believe it was Bas Rutten and Kevin Randleman, that was the first fight they had with judges. John McCarthy got in there and broke that fight up twice, so Bas could get back up and come back and fight him… just so he could uh to give Bas an advantage,” he said.

This decision by McCarthy, according to Abbott, gave the striker Rutten the advantage, leading to him beating Randleman via a controversial split decision. Rogan, predictably, agreed with Abbott and felt it was wrong: the referee broke them up as the rule mandating it didn’t exist yet. What are your thoughts on Rogan and Abbott’s take?