John McCarthy: Dan Miragliotta got Renato Moicano call wrong at UFC Vegas 123 — ‘It’s not fair’

"Big" John McCarthy doesn’t agree with Dan Miragliotta’s controversial fight-changing stand-up from UFC Vegas 123 this past Saturday.

The lightweight main event between veteran mainstay Renato Moicano and rising prospect Tom Nolan was one-way traffic through the first round and a half. Using his superior grappling, Moicano took Nolan’s back early and locked in a tight body triangle for most of the fight — until the referee, Miragliotta, unceremoniously stood them up.

Nolan immediately took over with his striking game and ultimately found the third-round stoppage.

McCarthy, one of the sport’s most tenured officials, explained what was wrong with Miragliotta’s stand-up call on Monday’s "The Ariel Helwani Show."

"MMA is a sport where you have all these different disciplines that you’re able to utilize," McCarthy told Uncrowned. "It’s not something that’s supposed to give an advantage to one particular style, whether it be a striking art or a grappling art. It’s supposed to be open. When you’re taking a look at it, Renato Moicano went out, and he was establishing that, ‘I want to take the fight to the ground and I want to utilize my grappling skills to get a win,’ and he was doing that. He did that throughout the first round; he got the takedown about a minute and a half into it. He kept it and had the figure-four body lock.

"I think Dan looked at that and gave him all the time to work with it. Then, when it happened, somewhere about a minute into the second round, he had that same position — ‘was he working,’ is the real question here. Many times, we talk about someone who gets a great position — what we call a seatbelt — and just holds on and just doesn’t do anything. Obviously, we have to tell them that they need to work and try to finish the fight, but we can’t ask them to improve their position when it is already the best they can be in."

LAS VEGAS, NEVADA – OCTOBER 31: (L-R) Tom Nolan of Australia elbows Renato Moicano of Brazil in a lightweight fight during the UFC Fight Night event at Meta APEX on October 31, 2026 in Las Vegas, Nevada. (Photo by Jeff Bottari/Zuffa LLC)Jeff Bottari via Getty Images

Stand-ups from ground positions aren’t uncommon in MMA. The biggest difference, however, is in this case McCarthy believes Moicano was obviously working and fighting rather than simply stalling without looking to advance position or do damage.

"The punches he was throwing weren’t going to knock Tom Nolan out. We know that," McCarthy said. "But they could create that one moment where Nolan made a mistake that led to a rear-naked choke. Our job as officials is supposed to be to be fair to both fighters. I don’t care if Renato Moicano or Tom Nolan wins; I care that they both get to perform to the best of their abilities, utilizing the skill sets they have worked so hard to attain, and whoever’s skill set is best is the one that should come out on top."

One talking point that’s been raised about why Miragliotta may have stood up the fight from such a dominant position has focused whether he was influenced from a restless crowd in the UFC’s Meta Apex. Although Moicano was working throughout the grappling sequence, he wasn’t necessarily close to finishing the fight yet, as McCarthy noted.

Regardless of the scenario and whether it made the fight less exciting and more susceptible to crowd influence, McCarthy doesn’t think that’s what happened. Instead, McCarthy explained, Miragliotta could have been considerate of the judges.

"I think it was a matter of him looking at it and thinking he had already given him a whole round and another half of a round without a finish, and then Tom Nolan grabbed hold of the wrist," McCarthy said. "That was the moment Moicano wasn’t being offensive for just a couple of seconds, and he decided to stand them up.

"The real problem with it is, it’s not fair. You gave a great advantage to one fighter over another. You created a disadvantage in the fight for Renato Moicano. He put the fight where he wanted; he had him in a position where he was in a figure four, and with that, it’s incumbent upon Tom Nolan to get himself out. It’s not for an official to get him out, especially when Moicano is working and trying. Nolan is working and trying, but he has to try to get out, or he’s going to be down two rounds.

"You look at it, and it’s a matter of what is fair," McCarthy continued. "Many times we’ll take positions away from fighters when there’s a foul, based upon the fact that we don’t want to take a point, but we’ll actually take them out of the position as a punishment because that’s our way of evening it out. ‘You fouled, so I’m going to take you out of the position, and now we’re going to be in a stand-up. You’re going to lose what you had gained, and that’s a way of us actually creating a punishment.’

"There was no reason [to stand them up], in my opinion — and look, I love Dan Miragliotta. He’s a great person, I’ve always gotten along with him, and I think he’s been a fantastic referee for the 27 years he’s been doing it now. This was just one of those instances. I think he was looking toward giving the judges more to go off of and giving the fans more to see, thinking there wasn’t enough going on, when that’s not his responsibility."

Moicano, 37, suffered a big setback with the loss after his successful rebound win over Chris Duncan in April. He has three fights left on his UFC contract before he intends to weigh his options in free agency and likely leave MMA behind for boxing.

Nolan, meanwhile, continues to surge, extending his win streak to six in the Octagon.

McCarthy harped on the neutral position debate — of which, Moicano’s back position was not — and said he’s personally never stood up a fighter from a body triangle in his 30-plus-year career as a referee.

McCarthy used the Charles Oliveira vs. Max Holloway rematch from earlier this year as a comparable example to Nolan vs. Moicano. In that fight, Oliveira largely dominated Holloway in similar positions for significantly longer periods, going the full five rounds.

With that in mind, Miragliotta’s mid-fight call creates an even deeper controversy — or conspiracy, as McCarthy highlights.

"The UFC doesn’t tell officials, ‘Hey, you need to stand people up.’ That doesn’t happen, but there are times when, look, you have to be honest about this. I am not saying that they were in any way influencing anybody in any direction, because they were not. But Renato Moicano is an older fighter, and the truth is that what is better for the business is for Tom Nolan to do well," McCarthy said.

"It’s not that they are sitting there doing anything to make this fight happen a certain way, but what works better is for Tom Nolan to win the fight. He is the up-and-coming young fighter that they can do a lot with. So when you look at it after the fact, did the stand-up help Tom Nolan? It absolutely helped Tom Nolan."

Ultimately, it’s too late to fix anything now in Nolan and Moicano’s cases. In the bigger picture, it wasn’t the worst longterm outcome for the UFC, McCarthy adds.

"You have to look and understand that Renato knew when he got stood up that he had just been screwed. Now, when I say screwed, I am not saying he is claiming it was inappropriate, but he knows he needs to be on the ground to be successful," McCarthy said. "’I got this fight to the ground, and now you are standing me up, and now

Source: sports.yahoo.com — article syndicated from the publisher’s feed; all rights remain with the original publisher.