Man, let me tell you about this whole Kim Winslow referee thing. It’s been bugging me for a while now, and I finally decided to dig into it. So, I started where anyone would – I just Googled her name. You know, “Kim Winslow referee.”
First thing that popped up? A bunch of stuff about her being an MMA referee. Apparently, she was the first woman to referee a UFC fight. That’s pretty cool, right? I mean, breaking barriers and all that. June 20, 2009, was the date I saw mentioned.
But then, things got a bit dicey. I started seeing a lot of chatter about her being, well, not the best ref. People were saying she was “consistently terrible” and making some really bad calls. There were even a few posts like, “What ever happened to Kim Winslow?!” from a few years back and some forum discussions from like, way back in 2012. Yikes.
So, I kept digging. I found this quote from her where she said she “stayed with the Lion’s Den and worked with Ken Shamrock Productions as an amateur referee.” Sounds like she at least put in some time before going pro.
Then there was this article talking about how her being the first woman to referee a UFC fight was this big historical moment. It had “Kim Winslow” and “Mixed martial arts” in the tags, so I figured it was legit.
Next, I stumbled upon some website called “Tapology.” They had all these stats and records for combat sports. You could get lost in that stuff for hours! It felt like I was going down a real rabbit hole with this.
I read somewhere that Herb Dean is considered the best MMA referee, maybe ever. They say he makes all the right calls and even Dana White, the UFC president, thinks he is the best. They called him the “gold standard”. And guess what? He was a fighter himself before he started refereeing in 2004!
Apparently, he’s pulling in like half a million a year, just from refereeing! That’s some serious cash. Top refs can make between $2,000 and $10,000 for big fights. Big money is in it.
Here’s what I learned about being a good ref:
- You gotta know martial arts inside and out.
- You have to know all the rules of MMA.
- You decide when a fight starts and when to stop the clock.
Anyway, back to Kim Winslow. It seems like a lot of folks have mixed feelings about her. Some respect her for being a pioneer, but others just can’t get past some of the controversial calls she’s made. It’s a tough situation, for sure. I just wanted to see what all the fuss was about, and now I think I’ve got a better picture of the whole situation.
