Ronda Rousey was solely two fights into her MMA profession when she signed with Strikeforce. Quickly after, she grew to become one of many faces of the game and helped usher ladies into UFC.
It’s been documented many instances over that UFC CEO Dana White famously mentioned ladies would by no means battle within the octagon, however Rousey grew to become the game-changer that altered his imaginative and prescient for the promotion. However all the way in which again in 2011, Rousey was simply an up-an-coming fighter hoping she may make sufficient of an impression for somebody like White to note her.
Wanting again now, Rousey admits she felt a duty to get White’s consideration, particularly with the data that ladies have been probably on the chopping block after UFC bought Strikeforce.
“Individuals overlook how fragile that scenario was and the way last-minute I used to be in a position to get us in,” Rousey advised Chris Van Vliet. “Strikeforce was the one group that was actually showcasing ladies and that was due to Gina Carano, as a result of her dad was concerned with the Nevada Athletic Fee and was in a position to sanction fights for her and all these items.
“When she was gone, Cris Cyborg’s pumped to the f*cking gills with steroids. Nobody desires to look at that dishonest ass bitch. All the things simply tanked. The division was dying. The UFC purchased Strikeforce and it was assumed they have been simply going to soak up the entire male expertise that they favored and fold the entire group, as a result of that’s what they did with PRIDE, that’s what they did with WEC, that was their enterprise mannequin. So there was a matter of time.”
Previous to Rousey’s arrival, Carano was undoubtedly the most important star in ladies’s MMA, however she successfully left the game in 2009 after she suffered a first-round TKO loss to Cris Cyborg. Her departure from MMA didn’t cease Strikeforce from selling ladies’s fights, however Rousey knew UFC shopping for the group was going to probably change all the things.
From that second ahead, Rousey made it her mission to get consideration by any means obligatory, and her devastating finishes mixed along with her penchant for the dramatic every time she touched a microphone helped her turn out to be a famous person.
“I used to be the primary girl signed to Strikeforce because it obtained purchased by Zuffa, and I used to be introduced in to exchange Gina Carano as a result of she was supposed to come back in for a comeback however she wasn’t medically cleared to come back again for her match,” Rousey mentioned. “So she pulled out they usually signed me to battle that very same chick, Sarah D’Alelio. So I knew the clock was ticking.
“It was only a matter of time earlier than they closed the entire thing and there can be nowhere that will showcase ladies’s MMA, so I had that a lot time to make it possible for Dana [White] couldn’t go a single day with out seeing my identify someplace. The remainder is historical past.”
Even after White determined to advertise ladies’s fights in UFC, Rousey nonetheless didn’t really feel like she was standing on strong floor.
In the beginning, ladies solely had one UFC division and it was headed up by Rousey alongside along with her appreciable capacity to attract a crowd. Even after UFC dedicated to a deeper roster for ladies and a number of divisions, Rousey nonetheless wasn’t positive what would occur if she simply determined at some point to stroll away.
“As soon as ladies have been dropped at the UFC, [Dana] mentioned, ‘That is an experiment, that is to see the way it goes,’” Rousey mentioned. “It obtained to a degree the place we needed to see how it could go with out me as a result of it was so depending on me.
“Whereas, I feel if I retired undefeated and left, I don’t know what it could be like. As a result of they’ve already introduced within the [145-pound] division and closed it. They’re not towards closing divisions.”
As of late, UFC promotes three totally different ladies’s divisions, and whereas no feminine fighter has reached stratospheric ranges of fame like Rousey, there’s loads of ladies’s expertise on the high of the game.
Rousey issued a reminder to the present crop of UFC fighters — female and male — that all of them share a duty that goes past simply coaching onerous and displaying as much as compete.
A part of the explanation she was in a position to persuade White to carry her and the ladies’s division into UFC was as a result of she commanded a lot consideration. Rousey believes extra fighters must take discover that their job goes thus far past simply combating.
“I feel one factor folks don’t perceive now as fighters — and those that do perceive it do extraordinarily nicely — it’s like, you must promote your battle as onerous as you prepare for it,” Rousey mentioned. “Lots of people really feel so safe of their place that they’ll simply present up and battle and they need to get all the things thrown at them. It’s not the corporate that promotes you. You shouldn’t expect the corporate to spend all this cash to advertise you. What are they going to do? Make extra commercials? It’s a must to go on the market and promote your self. It’s a must to go on the market and be a personality and make your fights right into a story, and the issues that I discovered from professional wrestling.
“Earlier than I even obtained into there, I used to be making an attempt to carry that into ladies’s MMA, and I feel lots of them overlook they’re not supposed to simply be athletes however entertainers. It’s not one thing you do on the facet. It’s one thing you do equally as onerous and put simply as a lot time and effort and focus into. Lots of people simply consider it as a trouble or one thing they must do as a result of the corporate makes them do it. That’s why you see some folks which are completely unimaginable and nobody exterior of MMA has ever heard of them.”
UPDATE: Cyborg has responded.
