If you are looking for one final clue about who most people—including the promoters—think will win Saturday’s UFC 193 main event, look no further than the fight card’s official tagline: The Rousey Revolution Continues.
Yeah. So. Uh…that bit of marketing doesn’t appear to even consider the possibility that Holly Holm might pull an upset over Ronda Rousey in Australia this weekend, does it?
With good reason, obviously. We have yet to see another woman bantamweight who looks like she even belongs in the same cage as Rousey. Holm comes in undefeated and possessing fearsome striking skills, but isn’t expected to be able to hang around long if the champion can get this fight to the mat.
So the questions we ask ourselves about Rousey no longer concern whether it’s possible she’ll lose her 135-pound title this week, but if she’ll lose her title, like, ever. Luckily for you, Bleacher Report MMA Lead Writer Chad Dundas and Senior Columnist Mike Chiappetta are here to separate the Rousey Facts from the Rousey Fictions.
And a boatload of other UFC 193 storylines, too!
Fact or Fiction: Ronda Rousey is Unbeatable.
Mike Chiapetta: Fiction. I would love Jon Jones’ chances against Rousey. Oh, wait, we’re talking about women here, aren’t we? Well, that changes things.
Rousey vs. anyone in her division is becoming just about the biggest lock in sports. Still, declaring someone “unbeatable” is hyperbole. Even if Rousey is as close as it gets, when you consider all of the distractions she regularly faces, focus must, at times, become an issue. From her burgeoning Hollywood career to endorsement opportunities to red-carpet and talk-show appearances, as well as personal drama spilling out into the public, her attention is divided like no one else’s in MMA.
So far, that hasn’t been any kind of issue for her when she competes. But it’s not crazy to believe this might make her more vulnerable at some point. The list of champions who have been undone by distractions is staggering. Mike Tyson was a 42-to-1 favorite when he lost to Buster Douglas 25 years ago.
Rousey’s challenger, Holly Holm, has a skill set that is elite in one area–striking. That could threaten Rousey if her mind is not where it needs to be on fight night. All it takes is one momentary lapse of focus. Is an upset likely to materialize? No. Rousey’s a lopsided favorite for good reason. She is significantly better than anyone else inhabiting her division. But the pressures of the crown have been lamented forever, and just a hint of distraction crossing over into the fighting arena can change fortunes forever.
Chad Dundas: There’s a radio ad on right now where Joe Rogan can be heard saying, “Once in a lifetime doesn’t apply to Ronda Rousey. It’s once ever—in human history!” So to say there’s a wee bit of mythologizing going on around the women’s bantamweight champion right now is an understatement.
Look, we know there are people who can beat Rousey because there are female judokas walking the planet right now who’ve done it—hence that bronze medal at the 2008 Olympics. But is anyone who can beat her going to show up in the shallow waters of the UFC 135-pound class before Rousey calls it quits and rides off into the Hollyood sunset? Doubt it.
However, I think Holm will come the closest of anyone. That is to say, not very close, but I expect her to give Rousey a round or two of fairly competitive action. Call me crazy, but if Holm can stay on her bike, fight from range and maybe land a few jabs and leg kicks, I think she can make things halfway interesting on Saturday night.
MC: OK, I’ll bite. You’re crazy. I don’t expect the fight to be competitive, even though Holm can stretch things out by staying on the outside. At some point they’ll get locked up, and Rousey will toss her to the ground, and due to Holm’s ground inexperience, that will be that.
I don’t think Holm can match up with Rousey the way, say, Cris Cyborg can. Rousey won’t be able to muscle her around so easily, and Cyborg has so much more experience than Holm does. She also has the power to shock the world with a single punch. Hopefully, that fight gets made soon.
Fact or Fiction: Joanna Jedrzejczyk steals the show with an easy win over Valerie Letourneau.
CD: I’m cautiously going to say this one is fact, Mike. Maybe I’m just too bullish on Holm’s ability to give Rousey an actual fight, but I think there’s a decent chance Joanna Jedrzejczyk emerges as UFC 193’s breakout performer.
It’s clearly no accident that fight company brass are putting Jedrzejczyk and Rousey together as a package deal here. They’re hoping massive amounts of pay-per-view buyers come for Her Rowdiness and leave just as taken with the Polish strawweight champion.
Our pals at Odds Shark make Jedrzejczyk a comparably sized favorite over Valerie Letourneau as Rousey is over Holm. That leads me to believe if Holm fares slightly better than expected and Jedrzejczyk does something terrible to Letourneau, it might unexpectedly turn out to be Joanna Champion’s night.
What say you?
MC: As much as I want to agree with you, given Jedrzejczyk’s immense likability factor, ain’t no one stealing the show from Rousey. The roughly 70,000 people estimated to show up to Melbourne’s Etihad Stadium are coming to take in her star power. The pay-per-view crowd is ponying up their $55 to witness whatever it is she’s going to do. She’s become an event fighter. You don’t steal the show from those.
That said, Jedrzejczyk stands to gain more than anyone else on the card as a supporting act. As you mentioned, the UFC is clearly showcasing her alongside Rousey for a reason. If she gives the people what they want, she’ll leave a much bigger star.
CD: Well, I hope that last part is true, at least. As Rousey’s star-power continues to gobble up headlines I’m starting to feel like Jedrzejczyk is women’s MMA’s best kept secret. The only question I have about her marketability—a point originally made by my Co-Main Event Podcast cohort and your former colleague Ben Fowlkes—is whether her more violent fighting style will appeal to the non-MMA fans who tune in to see Rousey.
If Jedrzejczyk beats Letourneau bloody, will the little girls and soccer moms the UFC is working so hard to pitch Rousey to be turned off? Or will they catch Jedrzejczyk Fever?
Fact or Fiction: The Mark Hunt vs. Antonio Silva rematch lives up to their first fight.
MC: Fiction. I was in Australia for the first fight between them, a surprise classic that materialized out of the Brisbane morning ether. Certainly, no one came to the arena expecting a rollicking battle that saw momentum given and taken in shocking bursts. Heavyweight fights generally do not follow that kind of arc. The almost universally accepted prediction was that within a round, maybe two, one of them would land some tree-smasher of a right hand and that would be that.
Instead, it was non-stop action. When the dust cleared, it was announced that the two combined for 184 significant strikes, a UFC heavyweight record. Soon after those unofficial totals, FightMetric revised the count upward, saying the number was actually 200. Each man was knocked down once, and they combined for 321 total blows.
Afterward, UFC president Dana White was so amped that he had a one-of-a-kind rematch T-shirt made. The euphoria, however, was short-lived. Silva failed his drug test due to elevated levels of testosterone, knocking some of the luster off his performance.
As rematches go, it’s cool, if unnecessary. The rematch can’t live up to the original, if only because both men left pieces of themselves there that day.
CD: Silva and Hunt both roll into this rematch with 1-3-1 records in their last five fights. Hunt is 41, Silva 36. I guess since both these guys needed something to do and there was a big fight card coming up in Australia, it only made sense to put them together one more time.
Given that their first fight ended in that majority draw, I can even see a strange, twisted logic to it all. But we would be fools to expect another classic.
These two heavyweights both only know one way to fight—and that’s with a never-say-die, swing-for-the-fences enthusiasm that is infectious to watch and terrifying when you try to reckon with the likely fallout.
After so much wear and tear on their bodies, however, I don’t think either guy’s chin will be up to another 15-minutes of rock ’em sock ’em. This one likely starts with a furious pace, but ends with someone getting tucked in for the night before the end of the first round.
MC: I agree. Heavyweights hit so hard that one brain-scrambler is usually the only one necessary. It’s difficult to reverse momentum once one lands that kind of game-changer. It occasionally happens, but not to the extent of the first matchup between these two monsters, when neither could hold off the other’s advances. That was an anomaly not to be recreated.
As the third fight down on the card, the expectations can be tempered anyway. Like I said before, this is the Rousey show, and everyone else is fighting for a glimmer of spotlight.
Fact or Fiction: Stefan Struve reminds us he’s still viable…and a decade younger than everybody else.
CD: Fact. At this point, it’s been 19 months since doctors cleared Stefan Struve to return from a career-threatening heart ailment and 16 months since an apparent backstage panic attack scuttled his planned fight with Matt Mitrione.
Struve lost his return bout to Alistair Overeem last December, but bounced back with a victory over Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira at UFC 190. Here he takes on Jared Rosholt, who is 5-1 in the UFC, but almost let himself get knockout out by “Dad Bod” Timothy Johnson in the late stages of a fight Rosholt otherwise dominated in August.
If Struve wins this—and I think he will—it will give him two in a row in the UFC heavyweight division, which is like four in a row in any other weight class. He’ll also remain just 27 years old, which in the hoary old 265-pound ranks, makes him still just a kid.
All in all, there might be a lot to like about Struve moving forward, eh?
MC: Fac…tion? To be honest, I’m torn on this one. Sure, Struve is only 27, but he has some serious mileage on him. This will be UFC fight No. 16 for him, which is in the top 10 all-time for UFC heavyweights. During his career, he’s been knocked out multiple times, had several injuries and suffered a heart problem that nearly forced him out of the sport.
Beyond those physical issues, he’s good enough to threaten anyone, but has struggled against the best opponents he’s faced. His most significant career win is over Stipe Miocic, but if the two were to meet again, Miocic would probably be favored. Bottom line: A win over Jared Rosholt isn’t going to suddenly make anyone a believer that Struve is a true title threat.
CD: Whoa, whoa, whoa. Nobody said anything about Struve being an immediate title threat. Personally, I try not to even speak the name of the cursed UFC heavyweight championship unless I have to, lest it bring some kind of terrible Cain Velasquez-esque injury plague down on my family.
But look, the 265-pound class badly needs young contenders, and if Struve puts Rosholt on ice, I think it’ll be good enough to lump him in with the current glut of guys waiting for Velasaquez and Fabricio Werdum to settle their business so they can vie for a title shot in 2016.
Struve vs. Big Ben Rothwell perhaps?
#wouldwatch
UFC 193 airs on Saturday at 10 p.m. ET, 7 p.m. PT on pay-per-view.
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