Big John McCarthy Defends Jason High: The UFC Wouldn’t Have Cut Jon Jones For Shove

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(I’m a cowboy, on a steel horse I ride…..oh yeah, lets get it on!)

Former UFC lightweight and welterweight Jason High had a pretty bad night when he fought Rafael dos Anjos at Fight Night 42; after being TKO’d in the second round of the high altitude pairing, the debuting 155-pounder got up and was clearly unhappy with the finish. As if things couldn’t get worse for High, now 2-3 UFC overall, ‘The Kansas City Bandit’ got up and shoved referee Kevin Mulhall.

Just to be clear, he didn’t swing a punch, but was clearly out of line in putting hands on the ref. Dana White instantly cut High for the infraction, and the wrestler was also slapped with a 12 month ban by the NSAC. Veteran referee Big John MCarthy stopped by to talk with Submission Radio this week about the treatment of High by the UFC, check it out:

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“Jason put his hands on Kevin and kinda pushed him away. It was wrong. To be taken out of the UFC – I understand what Dana White is doing and I’m not saying, you know, Dana is, he’s slamming his foot down, going don’t do that, you’re embarrassing me, you’re embarrassing my promotion, you’re embarrassing the sport, I can’t have that. Now the question is, if Jon Jones would have done the same thing, would he have kicked Jon Jones out of the UFC? He wouldn’t have. Now I  understand why, I’m not saying that he should, but Jason got punished in a harsh fashion. Now on top of, you know Dana removing him from the UFC, the New Mexico State Athletic commission has, you know suspended him for 1 year. That’s one year of time that he cannot make a living fighting. That’s a lot. You know, you’re having people take away your ability to make a living, based on one act”

As unacceptable and immaturely as High behaved that night, I can’t help but think that his losing record with the promotion had an affect on Dana White’s decision. I suppose it goes hand in hand with the Zuffa code of conduct, a policy that he been used many times to act as basis for cutting fighters in the past. McCarthy continued:

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Do I think he should have been punished? Yes. He should have had his hand slapped, he should have gotten, you know a five month suspension, he should have been fined, we’ll say twenty-five hundred, five thousand dollars. That’s gonna hurt him, he’s gonna feel it, but I think that overall Jason got treated very harshly for what happened.”

Do you think the UFC made an example of High unnecessarily, or were his actions deserving of the punishment?