ABC Votes Unanimously to Potentially Unify Confusing Grounded Fighter Rule

The unified rules of mixed martial arts have been anything but unified when it comes to the definition of what constitutes a grounded fighter, but that could all change soon.

The Association of Boxing Commissions and Combative Sports voted unanimously to pass an alteration to the definition of a grounded fighter at its annual conference in Scottsdale, Ariz., on Tuesday, according to a report from ESPN.com. The measure passed by a 42-0 count.

The new language states that a fighter will be considered grounded if they have anything more than the soles of their feet on the canvas. If a fighter has a fist or palm on the mat, an opponent cannot land kicks or knees to the head. However, a fighter will not be considered grounded if his or her fingers are touching the mat.

Since 2016, the unified rules have differed depending on the athletic commission after the ABC ruled that a fighter should have both palms or fists, or any other body part besides the soles of the feet, to be considered grounded. The change was initially adopted to prevent fighters from putting a finger on the mat to avoid being kicked or kneed in the head.

While the hope was that all athletic commissions would adopt the new rule by 2017, as many as 10 different MMA rule sets were in place this past April – with many disagreeing on the definition of a grounded fighter. That has led to widespread confusion among fighters regarding which ruleset is in place from state to state.

"It's a fighter safety issue," ABC president Mike Mazzulli told ESPN. "For fighter safety, the body here has decided to not go back, but change the downed fighter. Being unified is important enough to rewrite the downed fighter rule." Mazzulli is “very confident” that all commissions will pass the new language by July 1, 2020.

"Our end goal is to have our sport have a unified rule set in all states and commissions to help the fighters have a single rule set," Mazzulli said.