John McCarthy Says the Standup Was 'Completely Unfair' to Moicano

By Previously Staff, Previously

November 3, 2026

LAS VEGAS

John McCarthy says the standup was completely unfair, and the sport's most famous referee does not say things like that lightly. McCarthy, the pioneering UFC official who helped write the rulebook his colleagues work from, watched Dan Miragliotta stand Renato Moicano up out of back control at UFC Vegas 123 — and on Monday he said, in terms, that the call handed Tom Nolan an advantage he never earned.

Nolan owns the biggest win of his career. He also owns a problem he did nothing to create: almost nobody in mixed martial arts is talking about the finish without talking about the referee who made it possible first.

Nolan (12-1 MMA, 6-1 UFC) stopped former lightweight title challenger Renato Moicano at 1:28 of the third round in the UFC Fight Night 292 main event at the Meta APEX on Saturday, his sixth straight win, according to MMA Junkie. But the fight turned a round earlier, when referee Dan Miragliotta stood the fighters up while Moicano held Nolan's back with a body triangle locked in — a position the Brazilian had used to control most of the first round and had found again in the second, alternating strikes with rear-naked choke attempts, according to MMA Junkie.

On Monday, the sport's most famous referee weighed in, and he did not hedge. Speaking on the Weighing In podcast with Josh Thomson, former UFC official John McCarthy told MMA Junkie that Miragliotta had changed the fight.

"When you look at why did Dan stand them up, I think Dan looked at it as, 'We've had this position now a good portion of this fight and nothing's happened – let's get some action into it,'" McCarthy said, according to MMA Junkie. "He stands them up, and it's completely unfair to one fighter – Moicano. Moicano earned that position. He worked for that position. It's not an easy position to get to, and once he gets to it, it's his to have."

The argument is about what a referee is for

McCarthy's case, reported by MMA Junkie, Sherdog and Heavy, is not that Miragliotta favoured Nolan on purpose. It is that a referee reaching for action is already outside the job description. "(A referee) cannot make a bad fight good, but you can definitely make a good fight bad," McCarthy said, according to MMA Junkie. "We don't give advantages to one fighter over another. (Miragliotta) gave a great advantage to Tom Nolan, and took an advantage away from Moicano. I know Dan was not trying to be unfair. He was just looking at getting action going toward the fight. But in reality, people can look at it and say you were unfair, and they're right."

The stalling defence does not survive McCarthy's tape count, either. Moicano, he pointed out, was working: "If you go back and look, the last minute he was on Nolan's back before the stand-up, he had to have thrown 20, 25 strikes," McCarthy said, according to MMA Junkie. "He's working toward a finish: Which is the one that's going to cause Nolan a problem, and now he makes a mistake and the choke gets slipped in?" According to MMA Junkie, the standup came after roughly eight seconds of brief stall in the position — seconds, in a spot Moicano had spent minutes building.

What happened next is why this will follow both men. Moments after the reset, Nolan hurt Moicano and stole the round's momentum, then kept the pressure on in the third and finished him with punches, according to MMA Junkie. Moicano (13-8 in the UFC) has now lost three of his last four, a skid that includes a lightweight title shot less than two years ago, according to MMA Junkie. Nolan, meanwhile, did exactly what a fighter is supposed to do with a gift: he cashed it. None of this is his fault, and the win is real, ranked-opponent real. But until he beats somebody this good without an asterisk humming underneath it, the asterisk is the story.

Miragliotta, one of the sport's most experienced officials, has not publicly explained the standup, according to Sportskeeda. That silence is starting to cost more than an explanation would. A veteran referee making a veteran referee's mistake is a bad night. A veteran referee saying nothing while John McCarthy explains his job back to him on a podcast is a controversy with legs.

The rankings made it official on Tuesday

The bill arrived on Tuesday. In the updated UFC rankings, Moicano fell six spots to No. 14 at lightweight, while Nolan climbed five places to No. 7, according to Bloody Elbow. Moicano's own post-fight verdict was even blunter than the voters: "Congrats to Nolan, you're a beast," he wrote, according to Bloody Elbow. "I had a terrible performance. I was well trained. I managed to get the back control, but I couldn't do any damage, he was defending well." He has since called himself a journeyman in terms nobody would print in a family newspaper, according to Bloody Elbow — which is honest, funny, and also not quite the whole story of a fight in which he held the best position in the sport until a referee took it away.

Reese won sick, short a point, and barely cared

The strangest win on Saturday's card might belong to Zach Reese. Reese (11-4 MMA, 5-4 UFC) outworked Mickey Gall for a unanimous decision on the prelims, winning 29-27 on all three cards despite a first-round point deduction from referee Herb Dean for an accidental eye poke, according to MMA Junkie. Then he told reporters what the week had actually looked like.

"I got sick Monday – had like a nice 104-(degree) fever, had chills," Reese said, according to MMA Junkie. "But it's a little bit of adversity, and stuck through and got it done, so it feels good, I guess." Reese added that his best UFC performance, against Julian Marquez, came in a week when he had walking pneumonia, according to MMA Junkie — which either makes him the toughest scheduling problem in the middleweight division or its most honest man. He wants the January 18 date in Dallas next, he said, where he is 0-2 in the UFC: "It'd be nice to right that ship – third time's the charm," according to MMA Junkie.

A 13-0 debut, and a veteran back on track

Lucia Szabova arrived as the biggest betting favourite on the card at 9-1 and fought like it. Szabova (13-0 MMA, 1-0 UFC) stopped Tainara Lisboa with 100 seconds left in the fight to open the prelims, according to MMA Junkie, then asked for the February card in Sydney. "It's really an honor to fight from a small country like Slovakia," she said, according to MMA Junkie. "I proved tonight that a small country can make a big statement." On the same prelims, Piera Rodriguez (13-2 MMA, 6-2 UFC) swept Talita Alencar 30-27 on all three cards, according to MMA Junkie, crediting lessons from her 2024 disqualification loss for the composure.

Saturday: a heavyweight rescue act headlines Vegas 124

The APEX does not get a week to cool down. UFC Fight Night 293 — UFC Vegas 124 — goes Saturday, November 7, at the Meta APEX, and the main event is a heavyweight bout that did not exist two weeks ago: Waldo Cortes-Acosta (17-4 MMA, 10-4 UFC) against Johnny Walker (23-10 MMA), according to MMA Junkie. The original headliner, Gabriel Bonfim against Sean Brady, was cancelled after Brady withdrew — Brady later said a staph infection that started from a cut on his knee forced him out, according to reports of his BradyBags Show appearance — and Bonfim is off the card entirely, according to MMA Junkie and Wikipedia's event listing.

The co-main event may be the best fight on the card anyway. Tatiana Suarez and Virna Jandiroba finally meet at strawweight on their third booking: the first, in August 2023, fell away when Jandiroba withdrew with a knee injury, and the second, at UFC 310 in December 2024, was scrapped when Suarez withdrew with a health issue, according to Wikipedia's event listing. Davey Grant against Elijah Smith, SeokHyeon Ko against Wellington Turman, Billy Elekana against Lucas Fernando and Mantas Kondratavicius against Andre Petroski round out a main card that streams at 8 p.m. ET on Paramount+, with prelims at 5 p.m. ET, according to MMA Junkie.

Walker, for his part, arrives with a heavyweight knockout of Mick Parkin at UFC 332 in October behind him and a firm family policy in front of him: he told MMA Fighting this week he will never fight his half-brother, fellow UFC heavyweight Valter Walker, according to Combat Sports UK. "He can train with me in any fight camp," is as far as it goes. Sensible. The APEX has produced enough controversy for one month without adding a family dinner to it.

That is the shape of the fight week: one result nobody can stop arguing about, one heavyweight main event built in nine days, and one referee who could end the loudest argument in the sport by simply explaining himself. Until he does, Nolan's breakout win stays shared property — half his, half Miragliotta's. Ask John McCarthy. He already told you whose half was earned.

Previously covered the finish itself in our UFC Vegas 123 results story, the fallout in what's next for Nolan and Smith, and the reshuffle in Brady out, Walker and Cortes-Acosta in.