Cat Zingano appeals UFC 232 loss to Megan Anderson

At UFC 232, which went down in late December in Los Angeles, former UFC bantamweight title challenger Cat Zingano stepped into the cage with former Invicta champ Megan Anderson for a highly anticipated featherweight contender bout. Unfortunately, this bout ended in controversy.

Early in the first round, Anderson uncorked a well-timed head kick. Regrettably, her toe landed right in Zingano’s eye, causing a nasty laceration that forced the end of the fight.

Cat Zingano is now appealing this loss, arguing that an inadvertent toe to the eye is no different than a finger to the eye. It’s the hope of the fighter and her attorney Nathan Gable that the result of the fight will be overturned to a no-contest.

“The language of the Unified Rules regarding eye gouging is non exhaustive and the examples listed, namely ‘eye gouging by means of fingers, chin, or elbow,’ are not meant as the only methods by which a foul may occur,” reads the appeal (via MMAjunkie). “First, the language is plainly open ended, beginning with ‘eye gouging of any kind.…’ Had the Unified Rules intended to limit this foul to only the examples that followed and exclude toes from this foul, this rule would have been written with limiting language such as, ‘only eye gouging by means of fingers, chin, or elbow is illegal’ and omit the words ‘of any kind.’

“Additionally, had this rule been meant to limit this foul to only the examples that followed and exclude toes, then by the same logic, a thumb to the eye would not be foul as the rule merely mentions fingers, not thumbs.”

For what it’s worth, Megan Anderson has been very open to the idea of a rematch with Cat Zingano, which would give the two women a chance to fight to a less controversial result.

Do you think this result of this fight should be overturned?

This article first appeared on BJPENN.COM on 1/14/2019.