There’s a lovely old lady in Queens who flips arepas on the weekends. At this point in her life, she’s a New York City landmark. People from all walks of life smile at her and she smiles back. If you hand her a few dollars, she’ll hand you a few arepas. It’s a symbiotic relationship. Over the years, she has perfected her craft and if you think you can find a better late night snack on her street, she’ll point and laugh at you for lying to yourself. Kim Winslow feels similarly about her refereeing ability. Not only is she good at what she does, she strives to stay perfect every time her ponytail gets satellite beamed into your HDTV.
I am a perfectionist. I treat every fight like it is a title fight and want my performance to be perfect for the fighters. Things happen very quickly and we have to trust what we see and hear in the split seconds that it happens. We don’t get the benefit of replays or different angles. We get one shot and there is only one of us. Sometimes we get commentators that are not as educated as they should be about the rules and they will make comments about a stoppage we make and people will think since they are commentating that they must know. Who do you think knows the rules better – the referee or the commentator? I would also like to say that we hear so often how safe MMA really is and the reason for that is because we refs generally get it right.
Not only is Kim Winslow the UFC’s first female referee, she’s also the first person to understand the game better than anyone (including the doctors) in the rest of this interview with USCombatSports. Sorry Joe Rogan, there is no such thing as bad refereeing, only a lack of understanding on the part of the commentators. Don’t hate the player, hate the game. [Source]
