Miesha Tate finally detailed the extent of her arm damage by that fight-stopping Ronda Rousey armbar—two months after her unsuccessful defense of her Strikeforce women’s bantamweight title.
The following is an excerpt from Mauro Ranallo’s interview with Tate during the Invicta Fighting Championships on April 28, 2012:
Ranallo: What was the extent of the injury because I know you tweeted a picture of the arm and it wasn’t broken or anything? What happened to the arm in that fight?
Tate: I basically tore everything. I tore the inner and outer sides of my ligaments attached to the muscles and bone. They actually pulled the bone off with the ligament and then I tore all the muscles around that. So…it was pretty bad, but you know for me it wasn’t really that bad. I think that…I have the motto that as long as you get up one more time than you fall down then…you know what I mean, you are doing something right? So I’ll be back stronger than ever.
Finally, we have closure. Straight from the fifth straight Ronda Rousey armbar victim herself.
There was no Miracle at Columbus after all. Now, why did it take Tate all of eight weeks to finally clear the cobwebs covering the true medical condition of her arm? Why didn’t she spare us the wild guessing game as soon as possible?
Was it perhaps “machismo”? To show how tough she really is?
After all, she refused to tap out to Rousey’s first pretty tight submission attempt. She was even rather slow in tapping out to the second and final armbar hold, which could have largely contributed to that horrible hyperextension.
Maybe she didn’t want Rousey, who took away her belt, to have her cake and eat it, too. She must have thought, “OK, you made me tap out and stripped me off my belt. But, I’m still all in one piece (ouch).”
Or maybe she was doing our sport a “noble” service, a la Yuki Nakai of Japan.
In 1995, then-Shooto welterweight champion Nakai fought in the tournament Vale Tudo Japan. His first opponent was UFC 1 veteran and Dutch savate fighter Gerard Gordeau. Gordeau illegally eye-gouged Nakai, but the Japanese still eventually prevailed via heel hook.
For his second fight, Nakai successfully armbarred American wrestler and WCW performer Craig Pittman, who enjoyed a 100-lb. weight advantage.
For his third and ultimate bout, he finally succumbed and lost to the legendary Rickson Gracie, by rear naked choke in the first round.
After his courageous showing, Nakai kept a terrible consequence of that night of fights a secret from the public. He claimed that it wasn’t good for MMA, then still in its infancy, to have its fans know what actually befell a certain part of him.
For years, the brave fighter kept secret the damage inflicted upon him by Gordeau: permanent blindness in his right eye.
He felt revealing the full extent of his injury right away would’ve been bad press for MMA. He didn’t want the then-fledgling sport to suffer a black eye.
Now back to the beautiful Miesha Tate. Was she trying to send this message to the rest of the world?
“Hey, guys! Here in MMA, our limbs may end up appearing broken when they‘‘re actually not!”
Just what could be the real reason for her late confession about her really broken arm?
Your guess is as good as mine.
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