{"id":267614,"date":"2018-01-10T05:54:45","date_gmt":"2018-01-10T13:54:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/?p=267614"},"modified":"2018-01-10T05:54:45","modified_gmt":"2018-01-10T13:54:45","slug":"john-mccarthy-opens-bellator-commentary-gig-future-referee","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/mma-news\/john-mccarthy\/john-mccarthy-opens-bellator-commentary-gig-future-referee\/","title":{"rendered":"John McCarthy opens up on Bellator commentary gig, future as a referee"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Yesterday afternoon, we learned that veteran MMA referee &#8220;Big&#8221; John McCarthy had joined the Bellator MMA family as a member of the promotion&#8217;s broadcast team. Initially, it sounded as though McCarthy&#8217;s broadcast duties signalled the end of his career as a referee, but apparently that&#8217;s not the case. He still plans to work as an officiator in smaller shows.<\/p>\n<p id=\"TydC8i\">\u201cCan I go and referee? Yes, I can go and referee,\u201d McCarthy told <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mmafighting.com\/2018\/1\/9\/16871154\/john-mccarthy-says-hes-not-retired-from-mma-refereeing-but-focused-now-on-bellator-commentary-role\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">MMA Fighting<\/a>. \u201cIf I want to go and referee something internationally, I can do it. I can do small shows here if I want. I\u2019ll do charity events and things like that. I\u2019m not gonna say, \u2018Oh, I\u2019m retired.\u2019 I\u2019m not retired. At this moment, I\u2019m just taking on something else, so that\u2019s gonna go on the back burner. All of my attention is gonna go toward being the best color commentator I can be for Bellator.\u201d<\/p>\n<p id=\"VkOvJN\">\u201cI love officiating,\u201d he added. \u201cI love what I do. I love the people that I get to work with. I love all the fighters. But when I say I\u2019m &#8216;walking away&#8217;, I\u2019m walking away from what people are gonna expect. They think that I can commentate Bellator and then go ref a UFC \u2014 that ain\u2019t gonna happen. I\u2019m gonna be stepping away from what most people see of me as a referee. I\u2019m still gonna work with athletic commissions.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>McCarthy also shared his hopes for his Bellator commentating career. He hopes to not only educate fans on the fights themselves, but also on the rules and regulations that govern the fights.<\/p>\n<p id=\"6vl6Tw\">\u201cI think that\u2019s a big part of why Bellator thought of me to do this,\u201d McCarthy said. \u201cI think they\u2019re looking at it as the more educated their fans are, the more they\u2019re gonna enjoy the sport, the more they\u2019re gonna understand what\u2019s going on, the more they\u2019re gonna understand why the judges are doing something the way they are, why the referee is doing something.<\/p>\n<p id=\"PXLQlF\">\u201cI\u2019m here for the entire aspect of the fight. What the fighters are doing, why someone is being successful, what the other person has to do to counter what they\u2019re being successful with. That\u2019s all stuff that they\u2019re hearing now. But there\u2019s nobody right now that\u2019s out there that can explain and educate to the fans the rules of the sport and why fighters need to do something or why judges are going with one fighter over the other in a specific situation. I think I bring that \u2014 even at this early start of my career in commentating \u2014 I bring that to the table, while a lot of people are guessing when they\u2019re putting something out.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>At the end of the day, John McCarthy is simply hoping to follow in the footsteps of MMA&#8217;s great commentators by being knowledgable and well-prepared.<\/p>\n<p id=\"E8bMCd\">\u201cThere\u2019s a ton of work that goes in,\u201d McCarthy said. \u201cThat\u2019s why <a href=\"http:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/mma-news\/jimmy-smith\/former-bellator-commentator-jimmy-smith-expects-new-home-within-week\/\">Jimmy Smith<\/a> was so good, that\u2019s why<span>\u00a0<\/span>Brian Stann<span>\u00a0<\/span>was so good. They put in the work ahead of time to make themselves successful. And I\u2019m smart enough that I follow smart people. If I see someone doing something that\u2019s the reason they can be successful, I\u2019m gonna grab onto what they\u2019re doing and I\u2019m gonna follow it. I\u2019m gonna put in a ton of work to make myself successful, because I will not ever be ill prepared for standing in front of the camera or putting on a headset and telling people what\u2019s going on in a fight. My promise is I will always work my ass off to be the best that I could be.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>How do you think John McCarthy will do at the Bellator MMA broadcast desk?<\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><i>This article first appeared on\u00a0<\/i><a href=\"http:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/\"><span class=\"s1\"><i>BJPenn.com<\/i><\/span><\/a><i>\u00a0on 1\/9\/2018. <\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Yesterday afternoon, we learned that veteran MMA referee &#8220;Big&#8221; John McCarthy had joined the Bellator MMA family as a member of the promotion&#8217;s broadcast team. Initially, it sounded as though McCarthy&#8217;s broadcast duties signalled the end of his career as a referee, but apparently that&#8217;s not the case. He still plans to work as an [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":54430,"featured_media":157753,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false},"categories":[10176],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v19.7 (Yoast SEO v19.14) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>John McCarthy opens up on Bellator commentary gig, future as a referee | BJPenn.com<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/mma-news\/john-mccarthy\/john-mccarthy-opens-bellator-commentary-gig-future-referee\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"John McCarthy opens up on Bellator commentary gig, future as a referee | BJPenn.com\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Yesterday afternoon, we learned that veteran MMA referee &#8220;Big&#8221; John McCarthy had joined the Bellator MMA family as a member of the promotion&#8217;s broadcast team. 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He still plans to work as an [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/mma-news\/john-mccarthy\/john-mccarthy-opens-bellator-commentary-gig-future-referee\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"| BJPenn.com\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/bjpenn\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2018-01-10T13:54:45+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/big-john.png\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"730\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"380\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Tom Taylor\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@bjpenndotcom\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@bjpenndotcom\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Tom Taylor\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/mma-news\/john-mccarthy\/john-mccarthy-opens-bellator-commentary-gig-future-referee\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/mma-news\/john-mccarthy\/john-mccarthy-opens-bellator-commentary-gig-future-referee\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Tom Taylor\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/#\/schema\/person\/e1a3f1e5a045aeaf5b59aa1549a06a87\"},\"headline\":\"John McCarthy opens up on Bellator commentary gig, future as a referee\",\"datePublished\":\"2018-01-10T13:54:45+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2018-01-10T13:54:45+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/mma-news\/john-mccarthy\/john-mccarthy-opens-bellator-commentary-gig-future-referee\/\"},\"wordCount\":665,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/#organization\"},\"articleSection\":[\"John McCarthy\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"copyrightYear\":\"2018\",\"copyrightHolder\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/#organization\"}},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/mma-news\/john-mccarthy\/john-mccarthy-opens-bellator-commentary-gig-future-referee\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/mma-news\/john-mccarthy\/john-mccarthy-opens-bellator-commentary-gig-future-referee\/\",\"name\":\"John McCarthy opens up on Bellator commentary gig, future as a referee | BJPenn.com\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2018-01-10T13:54:45+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2018-01-10T13:54:45+00:00\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/mma-news\/john-mccarthy\/john-mccarthy-opens-bellator-commentary-gig-future-referee\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/mma-news\/john-mccarthy\/john-mccarthy-opens-bellator-commentary-gig-future-referee\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/mma-news\/john-mccarthy\/john-mccarthy-opens-bellator-commentary-gig-future-referee\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"MMA News\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/mma-news\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":3,\"name\":\"John McCarthy\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/mma-news\/john-mccarthy\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":4,\"name\":\"John McCarthy opens up on Bellator commentary gig, future as a referee\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/\",\"name\":\"| BJPenn.com\",\"description\":\"MMA &amp; 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