(“Good…goooood….let the hate flow through you.” via Getty)
At the risk of incurring her wrath myself, I will say that I’ve always found AnnMaria De Mars’ relationship with the MMA media, her daughter, and her daughter’s opponents to be a little…strange. I’m not saying she craves the attention, necessarily, but she certainly doesn’t seem to deflect it. She’s intense, is I guess the best way to put it.
Regardless, it would appear that De Mars maintains a closer eye on her cub than most parents would, especially when said cub is a 28-year-old uber badass and one of the most popular feminist icons on the planet. In fact, the only person in Rousey’s life who you could argue might have more say in her decision making process than her mother is Edmond Tarverdyan, Ronda’s longtime coach and another person who I personally find to be a bit grating.
So when Mama Rousey was recently asked to give her opinion on Tarverdyan, you would probably expect there to be a little bit of tension between them, to put it simply. What you probably wouldn’t expect is for De Mars to unleash the mother of all rants (no pun intended) on the Glendale Fighting Club owner, questioning everything from his abilities as a coach to the quality of his character.
Video after the jump.
“I think Edmond is a terrible coach,” she began. “And I will say it publicly. I think he’s a terrible coach, and I think he hit the lottery when Ronda walked in there.
“She was winning before she ever met him. She won 99% of the Judo matches she ever fought in. She had won the Junior Worlds when she was 17. She won a bronze medal in the Olympics. She won a silver medal in the world championship. She was one of the top athletes in the world, when she walked in there.
“And he wouldn’t even give her the time of day for months. Somebody like that is a terrible coach. And I think she stays there because it like somebody pitches a no hitter when they’re wearing red underwear, so they wear that underwear for every day. And I think it’s superstition, and I would caution everyone from going there.”
“And I think it’s bad that he uses her to lure other people in. And the reason I tell everyone – I told Ronda I’m not going to be quiet about it – he’s a bad person, and people should not go there. And if he wants to sue me, that’s an honest opinion.”
(*ahem*) Excuse me for a second….
That. Was. Nasty.
While it’s pretty evident that Rousey’s striking has improved leaps and bounds in her time under Tarverdyan, you could just as easily argue that Ronda owes most of her success to what she learned prior to joining GFC. Rousey is a once in a lifetime athlete who was already light years beyond her competition from the moment she first put on 4 oz gloves, and she would be where she is today in terms of skills, if not even more advanced, had she decided to train with a Jackson’s MMA or Tristar or so forth. At least, that’s what I think her mom is getting at.
That Rousey appears to be Tarverdyan’s only pupil to achieve outright success under his tutelage certainly doesn’t hurt De Mars’ argument. Travis Browne has gone just 1-1 since joining GFC, suffering a shocking loss to Andrei Arlovski in his most recent appearance. Marina Shafir — a former Judo player with skills reminiscent of a young Rousey — has been KO’d in 37 seconds in her last two fights. The rest of the fighters listed on Glendale’s Sherdog page are either amateurs with an 0-1 record, professionals with a losing record, or unheralded (but up-and-coming) talent.
As someone who used to routinely wake Ronda up with armbars and abandon her at all-male judo tournaments and call it “training,” I think De Mars should be able to tell the difference between a good coach and a bad one, but what say you, Nation?
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