re: State Athletic Commision

I beat Pennington fair and square...on the road. After he jumped up 14-0 in first quarter on two turnovers by my offense.

It takes like 1 minute to drain an ear like that. Here is the situation...Your ear will not stay like that. It will eventually subside, the swelling and fluid build up I mean.

So that tells me that that injury happened literally moments before the fight, while warming up in the back room. Could be possible they could not find the ringside doctor to have it drained, but it is more likely that the ringside doc simply did not have proper equipment to drain it.

A fight doctor, that is the physician hired to oversee fighter safety in the ring, usually do not bring with them much of anything. It is not their job to turn the dirty, sweaty workout rooms into an ER. Instead, they make sure the fighter is ok to continue, makes reccomendations on how long a medical suspension he should get, and makes the determination that the fighter needs to go to the hospital if that is the case.

SOME doctors will bring a suture kit to the fights for minor stiching on cuts, but not all. And none have the use for surgical tools, or even needles at the fights, so they dont bring them.

My guess is that James ear swoll up, they scrambled looking for the doc to drain it, but the doc said he had nothing to drain it with. Might have even said, "lets check the ambulance on hand to see if they have insulin needles (which, by the way are not ideal for draining ears...too small)" But ultimately ran out of time before TV producers tell you its time to roll.

And from my experience in the UFC, and Im sure its the same in Elite XC, if they tell you that you are fighting at 8:44, then that bell will ring in the cage at 8:44 and not a second sooner or later