Herb Dean (born September 30, 1970) is an American professional mixed martial arts referee and former fighter. UFC president Dana White, UFC color commentator Joe Rogan, articles covering MMA in ESPN.com, Foxsports.com, Bleacher Report, SB Nation (mmamania.com), Fightland and other publications have called Dean the gold standard for referees in MMA.
At UFC 48, held on June 19, 2004, Dean refereed a bout between Tim Sylvia and Frank Mir for the vacant UFC Heavyweight Championship. At 0:50 of round one, Dean called a stop to the fight when he saw Sylvia's right forearm break due to an armbar. Due to the close proximity of a UFC cameraman, in the video footage a shocked Dean can be heard shouting "Oh, shit!" when he saw the break, and he immediately moved in to stop the fight. This proved difficult, because Sylvia, who was still trying to defend the armbar, argued with him for several seconds, despite Dean's telling him "Stop, stop, stop! The fight is over!" Once freed from the armbar, Sylvia again began to argue with Dean, who continually told him, "It's fucking broken! Your arm is broken." Sylvia protested, claiming his arm was perfectly fine and even moving it around with no apparent problems. Dean, however, insisted that "I heard it snap. I saw it go." Ringside physician Dr. Margaret Goodman agreed with Dean's assessment, and the fight was not restarted. In the post-fight interview, Sylvia again denied that his arm was broken, however the slow-motion replay showed the break happening, and an X-Ray that evening showed significant damage to Sylvia's arm, which required surgery and a long recovery. Sylvia later admitted that he knew his arm was broken and wanted to keep fighting in spite of that, but he thanked Dean for saving his career by ending the fight when he did.