With MMA’s lawless origins, it would be tempting to call Rousimar Palhares a throwback to other times. But the truth is, even eye gouging was too inhumane for the original spectacle. All the way back in the early-1990s it was understood that sight, as a coordinating sense, can be useful in hand-to-hand combat. Digging eyeballs from the socket has never been encouraged by the sanctioning bodies or really anybody not directing cult horror films.
Yet in 2015, well into the era of unified rules and sophistication, there was Palhares trying to dig his thumbs into Jake Shields’ eyes.