A mixed martial arts fight was allowed by the referee to proceed for a full 38 seconds after the announcers began imploring him to stop it.
The stunning moment happened during the Fury Fighting Championships 76 bout between Edgar Cháirez and Gianni Vazquez. During the fourth round, Cháirez locked Vazquez in a triangle choke — and Vazquez immediately went limp and appeared to have his eyes closed.
But despite Vazquez appearing to be totally defenseless and perhaps even unconscious, and despite Vazquez’s own corner begging for the contest to be stopped, referee Frank Collazo stunningly allowed the bout to continue for 38 excruciating seconds.
Cageside announcer Alex Morono screamed at Collazo to stop the fight, to no avail.
“FRANK, IT’S DONE!” Morono screamed. “FRANK, IT’S DONE! WHAT ARE YOU DOING, IT’S DONE! WHAT IS HE DOING?! OH MY GOSH, WHAT IS HAPPENING?!”
Vazquez’s eyes finally opened, and he promptly tapped out. Collazo finally recognized that the defenseless fighter was giving up, and mercifully waved off the contest.
After the bout, Vazquez posted a photo of his arm in a sling on Instagram and slammed the referee for not stepping in to protect him when he was out.
“Some stupid referee … didn’t stop the fight when I was out now I have to deal with a potential fracture on my arm and some ligaments damaged too,” Vazquez wrote.
In a statement, Fury Fighting Championships slammed Collazo — who was assigned to referee the bout by the Texas State Athletic Commission.
“It is the referee’s job to protect the fighter when the fighter cannot protect him or herself. In last night’s main event, the referee failed to do this,” Fury wrote. “While the job of a referee is one of the hardest to do in this sport, the need for proper and continued training would help to alleviate things like this incident. We do not hire, train or select refs for our shows, but we would be more than willing to lead a revamp and overhaul of the reffing and judging selection and training process.”
Watch above.
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