UFC women’s flyweight champion Nicco Montano is used to playing the underdog role.
Heading into her title bout versus Valentina Shevchenko at this weekend’s UFC 228 from Dallas, Texas, it’s a role she finds herself in yet again. Montano is a massive underdog to former bantamweight title contender Shevchenko, with the betting odds rating her as one of if not the biggest underdogs ever for a defending UFC champion.
It’s a role she relishes, and one that she’s overcome to make her people proud. Montano is 25 percent Chickasaw, 25 percent Navajo and half Hispanic, yet identifies herself as Native (not Native American, which she considers a government-created label). The underdog role is one her people are unfortunately all too familiar with.
That’s perhaps part of the reason why her Native people were so proud she won the women’s 125-pound title by defeating Roxanne Modafferi at last December’s The Ultimate Fighter (TUF) 26 Finale. She told Bleacher Report’s Scott Harris that a parade awaited her with throngs of adoring fans when she returned home to her home city of Albuquerque, New Mexico:
“When I got the championship belt, the next day I came home, and there was just this mega parade,” Montano said. “And there were people hugging me and crying in my ear, and I’m like ‘You were my teacher! You know me!’
“There were so many people from so many different reservations. There were people who came all the way from Canada. And they were, like, jumping on me. When you’re indigenous you call somebody your brother or sister, like ‘Hey, brother’ or ‘Hey, sister.’ Now I had so many brothers and so many sisters.”
Montano believes her victory motivated her people to believe in themselves during a time when their honored history is slowly disappearing:
“I think that made them think ‘We can do this,’” she said. “There are traditional people who still live traditionally, live off the land, live in harmony with the land, who don’t have a job, who still barter and live off of handshakes and word of mouth. The Navajo language might be gone in 20 years. Soon it will be gone. … So when I did that, it really motivated them.”
But while that time period was motivation for those of her heritage, it wasn’t all roses. Montano said that many still believe in the stereotypes dealt to her people, something she said is baffling considering we are in 2018:
“They think we live in buckskin and teepees,” she said. “It’s 2018 and there are still people who ask that question.”
That sentiment apparently carried over into her employers at the UFC, whom she said wanted her to wear a Native costume with actual war paint on:
“They literally wanted me to put on a costume,” Montano said. “They literally wanted to see me coming out with war paint on my face. They think ‘Native’ and they think these things. I don’t want to be the token Native. I don’t want to be blasted on posters with a headdress on and with buckskin and a loin cloth.”
It’s not hard to see why Montano was resistant to such an antiquated request. Harris revealed the UFC did not respond to requests for comment on this issue, but an uproar would have certainly ensued if Montano had agreed.
To her, wearing such a costume would not have represented where she came from correctly, and understandably so. Instead, she wants to share the true history of her culture and values so the outside world can truly see where she came from:
“I do care,” she said. “Because I do want to get my word out. I want to be able to share my values and to have people see where I’m coming from.”
So while she won’t be wearing any stereotypical Native costume to promote her fights, she will be fighting for her Native culture on Saturday night. Montano closed by asserting her goal of being a shining voice for her people:
“When I got the belt, I wanted to be shining a light on my native culture,” she said. “Like, this is truly my motivation and truly where my mind is. When I fight, it’s so I can have a voice for them.”
Montano will battle Shevchenko in the co-main event of UFC 228, and based on what we’ve heard from her here, she’s fighting for a lot more than just the belt.
As always – and just like her people – she’ll be the underdog, and she’s just fine with that.
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