1. How Many Rounds Is Mma
2. How Many Rounds In Mma

Khabib Nurmagomedov called time on his legendary MMA career on Saturday night following his second-round submission win over Justin Gaethje at UFC 254.

His lightweight title defence against Gaethje marked Khabib's first fight since the tragic death of his father and coach Abdulmanap Nurmagomedov, who passed away in July due to complications caused by COVID-19.

• Round Time loss. Conor McGregor Dustin Poirier 0 1 29 48 0 1 0 0 UFC 257: Poirier vs. 23, 2021 KO/TKO Punches 2 2:32 win. Conor McGregor Donald Cerrone 1 0 19 0 0 0 0 0 UFC 246.
• UFC betting odds will be provided for OVER/UNDER round betting wagers. This is a bet you can make on how many rounds a bout will last. For a three-round contest, a bet will usually be OVER/UNDER 1.5 rounds. For five-round matchups, the OVER/UNDER is typically 2.5 rounds.
• UFC 258 has come and gone. It was the second pay-per-view event of the year and in many ways, the smaller event compared to UFC 257. As the first big event of 2021, UFC 257 was headlined by the highly anticipated rematch between Dustin Poirier and Conor McGregor.

To win in specific round: A wager on a fighter to win in a specific round, such as Jose Aldo to win in Round 1 +140, Round 2 +120, Round 3 +110 To win in range of rounds: A bet in which you’re trying to pinpoint in which round the fight will end, e.g., Round 1-2 +130, Round 2-3 +110. However, going into the semi-final stage of each series, fights are scheduled for the full professional three rounds, as opposed to two rounds (with the possibility of a sudden victory round) for all stages prior. Though officially exhibition fights, the UFC chooses to record the results of semi-final matchups.

An emotional Khabib revealed in his post-fight interview that he had promised his mother that he would not continue to compete without his father by his side - and so was announcing his retirement.

How Many Rounds Is Mma

'The Eagle' walks away from the sport with a spotless 29-0 record. In truth, rarely in the course of those 29 bouts has Nurmagomedov been troubled. To the credit of Gaejthe, though, he did manage to win a round against Khabib on the judges' scorecards at UFC 254.

Gaethje was awarded round one of their main event contest on two of the three scorecards. This marks only the second time that Khabib had lost a round in his entire MMA career.

The only other round that the Russian officially lost out of the 60 he fought as a professional was the third round of his October 2018 victory over Conor McGregor at UFC 229.

Below you can watch the third round vs McGregor if you scroll to 11:15.

To drop just two rounds in a career as long and distinguished as Khabib's is a phenomenal achievement. Indeed, it is arguable that Khabib was unlucky to lose the first session against Gaethje on Saturday night.

In a fairly even round, judges Ben Cartlidge and Sal D'Amato favoured Gaethje's striking output over Khabib's all-round pressure. It could have easily been said Nurmagomedov did enough to win the opening exchanges, especially given that he scored a late takedown. Judge Derek Cleary took this view, awarding the round to Khabib.

You can watch the opening round from last night's fight in the video below.

Even in the round that he lost to McGregor during their megafight, the 32-year-old was never in any trouble. The fact that Khabib went on to win the bout by submission in the very next round of that fight tells its own story.

Retirements in combat sports should typically be taken with a pinch of salt. In most circumstances, fighters can be tempted back for the right bout - or the right price!

Khabib, though, is a different breed of competitor. A highly principled man of his word, it truly seems that this is the end of the road for him in MMA.

The UFC may never see another like Khabib Nurmagomedov. Yes, of course, fighters will always emerge that will go on unbeaten streaks, but the sheer level of dominance that Khabib showed throughout his career is going to be very hard to match.

LAS VEGAS -- It's pretty amazing that the entire Tyron Woodley-Stephen Thompson rivalry was essentially decided in the final moments of their second fight.

All those hours of preparation, promoting both fights -- flights, hotels, side-by-side interviews -- two weight cuts, 50 minutes of competition inside the Octagon: It all came down to a single Woodley flurry at UFC 209.

As it should have.

Look, Saturday's UFC welterweight title fight rematch was an absolute dud in terms of entertainment value. Thus, it's tempting to simply bury it in the ground and forget about it.

Who won the first round? How about the second? Oh, oh, I know! Who cares, right? The fight stunk. Let's move on.

Except that fight brought up an extremely rare topic in mixed martial arts. And I think we need to have a conversation about this now so that the next time it comes up, we can be in agreement ahead of time.

It basically comes down to this: Does a 10-10 round exist in MMA?

Technically, it does -- for a very distinct purpose. If a fight is waved off due to something like an accidental head butt, and judges need to score a round that only lasted 10 seconds, they need a 10-10 option, yes? Of course.

How Many Rounds In Mma

OK, but how about a full, five-minute round in which neither fighter establishes an advantage of any kind over the other -- like the first round of the Woodley-Thompson fight? Do we get to use the 10-10 score then?

The reason this is so worth discussing now is that if that opening round of Saturday's title fight is not a 10-10, then there is no such thing as a 10-10 score. And for the record, none of the three judges scored that round 10-10.

Nothing happened in the first five minutes of that fight. According to Fightmetric, each welterweight landed five total strikes, which might be generous. Nothing significant landed, and there was no grappling whatsoever.

And yet, all three veteran judges scored the first round 10-9 for Thompson. Why did they do it? The most reasonable explanation, one that many observers mentioned aloud, is that Thompson established 'Octagon control.'

Did he? The main reasoning behind this seems to be that Thompson took the center of the cage, and Woodley spent most of the round with his back near the fence. That much is true, but does it represent 'control' for Thompson?

If anyone believes that's where Thompson wanted the fight to take place -- and/or where Woodley did not -- what are you basing that on? Past fights? Perceived skill sets? Nothing else really supports it. In fact, statistically, Woodley was slightly more efficient that round, landing 41 percent of strikes compared to Thompson's 31 percent.

After the championship bout was over, Woodley addressed fighting with his back to the fence. And based on his comments, it does not sound as if he views it as a position of disadvantage.

'Sometimes, when you're fighting a point fighter, you expect him to run around and stick and move,' Woodley said. 'I might need that entire 30-foot Octagon to go from my back against the cage all the way across with a blitz to get the opening I need.'

Again, this isn't the most exhilarating topic, so let's wrap things up with this: Athletic commissions basically tell us that 10-10 rounds exist, but they shouldn't be used -- that over the course of a five-minute round, a top-notch judge should be able to decipher which athlete held even the slightest advantage.

I am willing to argue that a top-notch judge should have the courage and ability to say, 'Hey, that was an anomaly 10-10. And I'm not going to put one of these elite welterweights at a massive disadvantage based solely on where they happened to be standing during a round in which nothing happened.'

Because the difference between 10-10 and 10-9 in a razor-thin, chess match, five-round fight is enormous.

Do 10-10 rounds exist? Barely. Five years may go by before we see another one. But if what we saw on Saturday doesn't qualify as one, what in the world does?