Can someone explain the obsession w/Ronda Rousey

I didn't see the fight but it looked like McGregor dished out a pretty good beating before he tapped out?

 

MacGregor won the first round but it looked worse than it was because Diaz tends to bleed like a stuck pig, he has bad eye/scar tissue.

The weights are a game. It's whoever can cut the most and has the best genetics for it and it really sucks the life out of a lot of fights. MacGregor probably weights 155-160 on fight day when he fights at 145. If anything, he should've had more energy for this one for not having gone through the dehydration process.

 

McGregor had a helluva first round but he punched himself out. By the second he was gassed... wasn't moving his feet well. He tends to carry his hands low anyway, that's how he gets the odd angles on his punches, but when he got tired it became an open invitation. He's also lacking a ground game, and when Diaz took it to the mat he got taken. He needs better advice on who to fight, and he needs a better BJJ coach, because that's a big hole in his game.

 

It's worth noting that it wasn't Diaz who took it to the mat. It was McGregor, out of desperation. That's how rocked he was. I don't think I've ever seen McGregor shoot for a double.

You can really put a pin in the turning point of the match, when Diaz landed a crisp 1-2 that put McGregor on his heels. Before that, McGregor may have been slowing down, but he was still winning most of the exchanges. After, he was a punching bag with a stupid tattoo. His quick and accurate strikes turned into slow and wild swings, and Diaz just kept moving forward. It was actually amazing to see how the tide turned so quickly.

I also think, by the second round, McGregor was frustrated by the fact that he hadn't put Diaz away yet. A lot of the shots he landed on Diaz would have leveled a 145-pound figther. Diaz just walked through them. McGregor's demeanor went from confident aggression to cautious panic. The one-and-a-half rounds of that fight were some of the most intriguing I've seen.

 

"A punching bag with a stupid tattoo." Bravo, sir.

And what you mentioned is the biggest thing about the weight difference. McGregor didn't have enough power/energy to do what he does to guys 25 pounds lighter. The efficiency of his punches were negated by Diaz's size.

 

Yeah. I think until I'm proven wrong I have to question McGregor's chin.

 

Again, his chin is fine at 145.

 

Yeah, he took some hard shots from Chad Mendes, considered a power puncher in the 145 weight class, last year, and was able to eat them before finishing the fight in the second round. For the past few fights, his style has been to eat a punch so he could deliver a couple of his own. It didn't cost him until he was against a bigger opponent with a longer range.

 

With the UFC looking to promote Rousey/Tate III next it's an interesting time for Rousey. Whatever happens, I don't think Rousey is long for the world of MMA. So, her beating Tate and then walking away strikes me as a scenario that is possible.

If that happens it would be horrible for Rousey, in terms of her current public perception and her future legacy, if she were to beat Tate and then retire.

Tate beating Holm has validated Rousey somewhat. It shows that not everyone Rousey beat was a clueless incompetent, as had become fashionable to suggest in some quarters.

Retiring after beating Tate for a third time would make her look like a bully and the ultimate front runner. If she fights Holm again and loses there is no disgrace in that. Styles make fights and losing to another fighter who has your number is nothing to be ashamed of.

The thing with Rousey is that I think she will care about her fighting legacy; swept up in a whirlwind of emotion following her loss to Holm it might not be a primary concern now but I think she will care deeply about it in years to come. Money is great, and maybe I'm wrong, but I think Rousey was validated by her success and the perception that came with it. I'm sure Rousey likes money but she never struck me as an athlete motivated primarily by money. People whose primary motivation is money don't dedicate years of their life to high level judo competition.

Unless Holm goes out and gets herself battered in the interim, Buster Douglas style, not fighting her again will leave an asterisk next to Rousey's name. In 10 or 15 or 20 years time when knowledgeable people talk about Rousey they'll say that she was a gifted fighter (exceptional at some things less so at others) who couldn't deal with, nor had any interest in dealing with, adversity. That she was scared of fighting someone who had hurt her. That, perhaps, Rousey wasn't able to master fear. That, maybe, she didn't want to fight Cyborg at 145 lbs not because of a principled stand against PEDs but simply because she was scared. I think that perception (and it will be the one that exists within the fight game) will grate on Rousey in the longterm a lot more than fighting Holm again and losing would.

If she fights Holm again and loses people on the Internet will mock her in the short term (people on the Internet love to mock) but when time passes and her fighting career is talked about in retrospect the opinion will be that she was a great fighter within the context of her time but that Holm just had her number. If she avoids a second Holm fight there'll be a sense that she wasn't a true fighter at all, and in her heart of hearts (in the dead of night) I think she'll think that too. Fighting and losing is okay. Not taking the fight shows that all the baddest woman on the planet, Amazonian warrior queen shit was just promotional hype and that she wasn't a true warrior at all.

It'll be harsh, and I'm just a keyboard warrior, but if you're a fighter (if you take the King's shilling, so to speak) people are going to judge you in the terms that they judge fighters. If like Rousey you were sold as a great fighter then you're not going to judged in the abstract. You're going to be judged as part of the pantheon of great fighters.

Walking away without re-matching Holm would be understandable on a human level, and if she does so it shouldn't be viewed as an indictment of Ronda Rousey the human being. We're not all warriors and that's fine. It will though be an indictment of Ronda Rousey the fighter.

 

I think you were looking for HotTakes.com. Did you go to the wrong bookmark?

I think Rousey will face Tate again, and if she wins, the money might be too good to pass up another Holm fight, and possibly two, depending on how the rematch goes. After that though? I mean, as much as competition is important, as a fighter you're still getting punched in the face for a living. I doubt it's that appealing when you have enough celebrity status to get a couple million acting. This isn't like the big four professional sports, where an elite competitor can make $20M+ a year from a contract, or even boxing, where you're going to get a huge cut of the PPV. Per The Internet, she's only making around $100k to $250k per fight because of the UFC's pay structure. (Maybe she's getting a piece of the PPV, like a boxer would.)

 

Here's how I see it going down:

Rousey will beat Tate in the all-but-announced rematch. Even if Tate has improved, Rousey is still a nightmare matchup for her.

In the meantime, Holm will probably have to take another fight. I could see it against someone like Amanda Nunes, who also has a claim to a title shot. The winner of that would face Rousey after she has recaptured the title.

And if that ends up being Rousey-Holm II, it is the perfect exit point for Rousey. She either retires champion after beating the one woman who beat her or she leaves after realizing she's no longer at the top. She'll go on to do more crap movies and will realize the spotlight isn't as bright when you aren't regularly fighting. That could lead to an ill-advised return to the octagon to face whoever is champ at the time. The UFC would move her right into a fight like that because she is big business.

And yes, sgreenwell, fighters like Ronda, McGregor and other top names get points on the PPVs. McGregor's purse for Saturday's fight was $1 million, but I bet you he clears north of $5 million off of PPV rewards.

 

Lawsuits have given us an idea of how the UFC's contracts for name fighters work. We know, for instance, the specifics of the deal offered to Eddie Alvarez. The contract that the UFC offered him ended up as an exhibit in a lawsuit that Bellator, who Alavarez had been fighting for, filed against him.

Lawsuit Filed Against Alistair Overeem Reveals Financial Details Of His UFC Contract - MMA Convert | RM Sports

"......An eight-fight deal would start Alvarez at $70,000 to show and $70,000 to win and raises in $5,000 increments with each win until it tops out at a guaranteed $210,000 for a win, the exhibit states. Alvarez would also be guaranteed a $250,000 signing bonus, payable in two installments of $85,000 and one of $80,000. When Alvarez fights on a UFC PPV broadcast, the offer states it entitles him to $1 for each “buy” between 200,000 and 400,000 buys, $2 per buy between 400,000 and 600,000 buys, and $2.50 per buy over 600,000 buys.... "

Details of Alistair Overeem's UFC deal also came out in another lawsuit.

Lawsuit Filed Against Alistair Overeem Reveals Financial Details Of His UFC Contract - MMA Convert | RM Sports

"...Pursuant to the terms of Overeem’s UFC contract as outlined in the complaint, he is guaranteed a “bout fee” of $264,285 on Dec. 30. Should he defeat Lesnar, Overeem would receive an additional $121,428 “win bonus.” Overeem is also in line to receive a $2 pay-per-view bonus per viewer, “for all revenues received by UFC-Zuffa for telecast of the Lesnar fight in the United States, Canada or over the internet in excess of $500,000.”

Terms of the contract also guarantee Zuffa would pay Overeem $1 million spread out evenly over the first three fights of his deal..."

Now, I have no idea of the specifics of Rousey's deal but I think it's safe to say that it would be at least as lucrative, and possibly considerable more lucrative , than the ones offered to Alistair Overeem and Eddie Alvarez.