Not even a week has passed since tremors were felt last Saturday night in Australia, when, in front of the largest crowd ever for a UFC event, Ronda Rousey was defeated in what is being referred to as one of the largest upsets in MMA history .
Urged by the journalists present at the UFC 193 post-fight press conference, Dana White confirmed that an immediate Holly Holm rematch with Rousey is the likely next step.
“The rematch makes a lot of sense,” White said. “I think the rematch is what people would want to see.”
“I think a rematch makes sense for sure,” echoed Holly Holm seated by him. “I’ve been on the losing side of a fight, and I wanted the rematch, I wanted to avenge my loss. With a champion like Ronda who has gone out of her way – above and beyond – to do great things, absolutely, she deserves a rematch.”
Well, there’s no doubt that Ronda Rousey deserves a shot to the belt more than any other girls, because, despite the lesson she took from Holly, she got rid of the rest of the competition with disarming ease. And not just that, if it wasn’t for her perhaps there wouldn’t even exist a female division in the UFC; No Holly Holm, no Joanna ‘Champion’ or Paige VanZant, no sold out stadiums. Ronda Rousey was much more than the bantamweight champion, she was the jewel of the UFC’s crown. Ronda Rousey deserves more than a rematch: she deserves time. She will need it. Sure, she needs to rest, yet this is not the reason why she needs time. She needs it to improve, to train and bridge the gaps masterfully brought to light by Holm.
The Saturday night main event looked a lot like the TJ Dillashaw vs Renan Barao bout, the first one, at UFC 173, when TJ surprised everybody and beat the Brazilian, achieving what had been impossible to anyone else for the last decade. That night the Team Alpha Male product showed to have found the key to unhinge Barão’s game, the same way as Holly Holm did. The same way as Rousey, the former bantamweight champion looked powerless before his opponent. No doubt that Barão deserved more than anybody else the chance to fight Dillashaw again – Dominick Cruz, lo and behold, was injured – still, very few people was interested in the rematch. Why? Beacuase everybody knew how it would have ended: TJ would have won again. And so he did. 14 months after, at UFC on FOX 16 in Chicago, it was even easier than the first time.
Ronda Rousey is in a similar position right now. Had she to face again Holly Holm tomorrow, or in the next six months, she would most likely lose once more. Obviously, she could also win, she has both the qualities and the tools to do so, as Junior dos Santos had when he knocked out Cain Velasquez in 2011. Though, considering the ease ‘The Preacher’s Daughter’ exposed some huge gaps in her opponent’s game with, it’s plausible to anticipate that she will win again. And I seriously doubt that’s what the UFC want.
If Rousey loses in a Holly Holm rematch, as Barão did against Dillashaw, she would disappear as the Brazilian did, if not from the Octagon, from the fans’ heart and from the spotlight. Her stardom would inevitably fade and the purpose of the UFC is not to smash their stars, is to raise them.
As I wrote few weeks ago, the UFC makes mistakes, but has a tendency to not repeat them, and here they have another occasion to show it. Waiting for Ronda Rousey’s return to competition, the UFC won’t lack good alternatives. With Holly Holm, Miesha Tate, Cat Zingano, Amanda Nunes and of course Cris ‘Cyborg’ inside the octagon, a year will pass swiftly, even more if needed be. More, a lengthy absence of Ronda could be a unique opportunity: the opportunity of building a new star. Similar to what happened in the light-heavyweight division, where the suspension of Jon Jones has revived the entire division and allowed the explosion of Daniel Cormier. Give time to Rousey’s star to restore its radiance and you may find yourself with two of them in the palm of your hand instead of a single dying one and a handful of glowing embers.
It won’t be easy. The challenge ahead of Rousey is arduous. As Renan Barão and Junior dos Santos showed, when your opponent finds the antidote to the venom you built your career upon, to make up a different one, or event just to tune it it’s a mighty endeavor. Yet, if there’s any person in the world of Mixed Martial Arts capable of such feat, a person who has defied the odds and achieved what was deemed to be impossible, that person is none other than Ronda Rousey.
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