Dana White was far from impressed with referee Chris Tognoni, taking aim at the veteran official after two controversial stoppages overshadowed the action during Week 4 of Dana White’s Contender Series last night.

The UFC CEO was so unhappy with one of the stoppages that he criticised Tognoni while personally awarding Modestino Rodrigues his UFC contract.

“One of the worst stoppages I have ever seen on Contender Series,” White told Rodrigues. “Horrible stoppage by the ref. Not your fault; you were doing your job and doing what you were supposed to do.”

Chris Tognoni officiated both Modestino Rodrigues vs. Brandon Holmes middleweight bout and Gabriel Lorenco vs. Charlie Cleveland heavyweight bout at the Meta APEX in Las Vegas, and the two fights resulted in almost opposite complaints about his officiating.

The biggest came when Rodrigues (8-1) knocked Holmes (6-2) out in just 15 seconds. After dropping the 29-year-old with a powerful right hand, Rodrigues immediately attempted to follow it up with ground strikes. However, even before Holmes was completely out, Tognoni stepped in and waved off the contest, giving Holmes little time to get back into the fight.

The decision was especially hard for Brandon Holmes because Tuesday was his second appearance on the Contender Series. The 29-year-old had already suffered a first-round knockout loss to Cam Rowston at the DWCS in 2025; thus, another early setback appeared to have killed his chances of ever landing a UFC deal.

However, Dana White later stated that the circumstances would earn Holmes another opportunity.

“Yeah, listen, we owe that guy. Yeah, definitely,” the head honcho said when asked whether the South Carolina native would get another chance considering the controversial end.

However, that was just one of the bad calls Chris Tognoni made on Tuesday night.

In the heavyweight bout between Gabriel Lorenco (8-1) and Charlie Cleveland (6-2), the criticism went in the opposite direction. In the first round, Cleveland was rocked by a right hand before scrambling back to his feet, only to be met with multiple elbow strikes to the back of his head and a flurry of hammer strikes from the Brazilian.

As the attack continued, Charlie Cleveland’s mouthpiece came out of his mouth as he was attempting to get to his feet. However, Gabriel Lorenço continued to land at least 10 more hammer fists and punches while the referee waited for the opportune moment to step in.

Finally, Chris Tognoni stepped in and pushed Lorenco away from his downed opponent. And this very sequence drew Dana White’s second major complaint, with the UFC boss pointing out the irony of Tognoni intervening too quickly in one fight and too late in the next.

“And then, and then he had another one,” White said further in the presser, referencing the Gabriel Lorenco and Charlie Cleveland fight. “You know what I mean? Uh, you know, he had the worst stoppage ever when the guy’s mouthpiece fell out and he got hit with eight more punches than he should have got hit with, and then he goes the complete other way on the next fight.”

The contrasting decisions were especially notable given Dana White’s previous history with Tognoni. The UFC CEO has often criticised the referee for some really questionable officiating, such as the 2020 fight between Mike Rodriguez and Ed Herman.

Tognoni mistook a legal body knee strike from Rodriguez for a low strike, giving Herman time to recover before the fight resumed. And to make things worse, ‘Slow’ then went on to submit Rodriguez in the third round.

The head honcho also chastised Tognoni following the controversial Jessica-Rose Clark vs. Sarah Alpar fight at UFC Vegas 11, where a knee that appeared illegal was ultimately ruled legal on replay before the fight continued.

This time, the issue was not a single problematic call. Chris Tognoni drew criticism for calling one fight too early and another too late on the same night, raising concerns about his officiating consistency.

The debate even spilled over to the commentary team, with some viewers blaming Laura Sanko and Michael Chiesa for not being critical enough of what was going on in the cage.

Fans pile on Chris Tognoni while UFC commentators get caught in the crossfire

As soon as fans saw the stoppages, they did not shy away from going off on Chris Tognoni. One fan wrote, “Tognoni has been a world-class f—tard.” Another fan summed up the bizarre sequence of stoppages by writing, “Horribly late stoppage followed up by a horribly early stoppage. Can’t put into words what a f—— imbecile Tognoni is.”

“Tognoni had a ‘Herb’ night. He looked worse,” another viewer wrote, comparing the referee’s performance to controversial nights from veteran official Herb Dean, who recently rocked the UFC with some controversial decisions.

Others argued that Tognoni’s issues were nothing new. “He has stoppages like these all the time; the dude is just not a great referee,” one fan claimed, while another accused him of something bigger: “playing with people’s careers with no repercussions.”

Fans were quick to argue that the commentary team should have been more vocal about the stoppages rather than simply describing what was happening.

“I’d like to see the commentators be a bit more critical when referees screw up that badly. That was an absolute dogwater stoppage. They should call it out,” one fan wrote.

Another questioned Laura Sanko’s analysis of a sequence involving shots to the side of the head, writing, “Exactly how is that stupid female (Laura Sanko) talking about shots to the side of the head???? Is she blind!?? Could she not see it was back of the head?”

Michael Chiesa faced criticism as well. “Chiesa is the ultimate company shill. It’s quite literally the only reason he has this job,” a fan wrote. Another viewer similarly accused Chiesa of “glazing the UFC”. He wrote, “Chiesa is a loser just glazing the UFC to stay on the commentator desk.”

One more fan chimed in with, “Chiesa dumba– maybe pay attention to what’s going on. He won by split decision, you M—-, he has no business being there.”

However, not everyone agreed that commentators should be blamed for the commission’s decisions.

“Do you really think if the commentators say something the commission gives a flying f— what they have to say?” one fan asked. Another chimed in with, “Dana White is all for free speech until it comes to criticising refs. Then he blames the commission and says he has no control over it.”

And well, they do have a point. The debate over how commentators should handle officiating errors has historically been a major issue for the UFC. Dan Hardy publicly clashed with referee Herb Dean at UFC Fight Island 3 in 2020 after continuously calling for the fight between Francisco Trinaldo and Jai Herbert to be stopped.

To make things worse, Hardy later had a heated exchange near the cage with the veteran referee. So what was Dana White’s response? The head honcho made the promotion’s position clear, warning that any UFC employee who approached or confronted an official would lose their job.

“If you work for me and you approach a judge or a referee or any type of official, I will fire you,” White said at the time.

As for Dan Hardy, he was eventually released from his UFC broadcasting and commentator duties in 2021, but this was following a separate workplace dispute.

In Chris Tognoni’s case, though, the bigger question coming out of Tuesday night is why the same referee ended up getting criticised for stopping one fight too quickly and another too late on the very same card and if the UFC is really going through a refereeing crisis.