Ronda Rousey: So many people live to hate me, ‘but when I’m gone, they’re going to miss me’

Few athletes in mixed martial arts will ever experience a ride quite like the one Ronda Rousey is enjoying. Within a span of five years, Rousey has risen from relative obscurity to genuine international superstardom, paving the way for women to fight in the UFC while improbably becoming the highest-grossing draw in an otherwise male-dominated sport.

“I don’t even think I’m going to know what is going on right now or realize what is going on right now until afterward, until it’s all done,” Rousey reflected Monday on the Joe Rogan podcast.

“I could just try to do the best that I can in the moment, but I don’t really think that any of us really comprehend what’s going on right now until we’re looking at it in hindsight. And that’s the kind of thing, I think it’s kind of funny. There’s so many people who just live to hate me, but when I’m gone, they’re going to miss me. They really are.”

For Rousey (12-0), things only gets bigger from here. The UFC’s undefeated female bantamweight champion is slated to defend her title Nov. 15 against Holly Holm in front of a crowd of potentially 70,000 fight fans in Melbourne, Australia. If the event’s turnout matches expectations, UFC 193 would smash the promotion’s previous attendance record held by UFC 129.

But breaking records, it seems, is what Rousey does these days. Her latest title defense at UFC 190, a 34-second massacre over Bethe Correia, drew the highest pay-per-view marks of 2015 despite a lackluster undercard. The momentum for her global popularity ostensibly explodes with every successive fight, and even small things, such as her recent ‘Don’t be a DNB’ campaign, seemingly turn to gold overnight.

Though despite already being a cultural feminist icon and role model for young women, Rousey views herself in an interesting light.

“I’m not the protagonist. I’m the antagonist,” Rousey said. “Because the protagonist just reacts. They do nothing. The whole storyline, the whole everything that goes on, is completely dependent on the antagonist.

“I’m the one who’s forcing everybody to do something, and so I like to think of myself as more of the heel, the bad guy who you somehow sometimes root for. You can’t help it a little bit sometimes, but sometimes you hate them. I think the fact that mixed emotions come out is one of the more interesting things. I’m not trying to have everyone like me. I’m trying to have everybody care about what I’m doing.”

Between movies, marketing campaigns, and a tireless fight schedule, Rousey is perhaps the most sought after mixed martial artist since the heyday of Brock Lesnar. And yet her busy calendar rarely reflects itself in her fights. Of her 12 professional wins, 11 have ended inside the first round, the last four of which have ended in 66 seconds or less.

With those quick victories has come an aura that’s drawn repeated — and admittedly lazy — comparisons to Mike Tyson. In the mainstream media, Rousey fights have become bigger than any others.

That spotlight generates a unique pressure hard to describe for the uninitiated, and Rousey said that same pressure has become an advantage she can levy against opponents, most of whom are strangers to the bright lights.

“I notice a lot of these girls, they would like to win a UFC belt and have that respect, but they’re not about that life,” Rousey said. “They don’t want that life. They don’t want that attention, scrutiny, pressure, and constant work and all of those things. They don’t want it. They want one thing without the other, but it all comes together.

“And that’s I think one thing that’s kind of working against them, is when they actually come in to fight me, they get a taste, a small taste, of what that life is going to be like when they’re a contender — because it is way more attention, way more this, way more that. And once you win the belt, it’s just doubled every single time. It’s more and more and more and more. And I don’t think any of them would actually be happy with that lifestyle. I don’t think they really, truly want it.”

Rousey admitted that at some point within the next handful of years, she’ll have to sit down and ask herself what is next. If she continues to win, her portfolio of options outside the sport of MMA will only grow more lucrative, and Hollywood makes for a more comfortable lifestyle than getting punched in the face for a living.

But still, she can’t think about that yet, not while there’s still work to be done.

“It just seems unfinished. My career, there’s more left to do,” the 28-year-old said. “I don’t feel like I’m done yet. Because with the Olympics, it’s just like you win the gold medal and you’re done. With the UFC, when am I really done?

“But I’m not going to be doing this in my thirties,” Rousey added later. “I don’t want to be fighting into my thirties. By thirties, I mean like 31, 32.”

Aside from Holm, the most obvious mountain Rousey has yet to climb is the one rival who continues to float on the periphery like a thorn in the UFC champion’s side: Invicta FC featherweight standout Cristiane “Cyborg” Justino.

Rousey admitted that putting Justino behind her once and for all would “definitely” put her closer to feeling like she’s accomplished every she needs in the sport, and that if Justino “showed sooner rather than later,” Rousey isn’t sure how much longer she’d continue fighting once the rivalry was settled.

But Rousey also doubled down on her stance that the fight would have to be at 135 pounds, inferring that Justino is still taking performance enhancing drugs while backtracking away from directly accusing her.

“Someone who uses steroids and those kind of things, they need that to mentally think that they have an advantage that they didn’t earn,” Rousey said. “It’s a crutch for her. She needs to feel like she somehow has an advantage from the outside, because she doesn’t think she’s good enough with just what she has. That’s why you dope in the first place, because you feel like the best you have isn’t good enough. She feels like, if we fight fair, the best she has isn’t going to be good enough. That’s why she wants it to be somehow stacked in her favor.

“That’s the thing, when you look at these people from before, when they’re using, and after, when they’re not, they look entirely different. And ‘Cyborg’ looks and weighs exactly the same. If she gets off, it’ll be very easy for her to make weight, from what we’ve seen with every single other person that’s gotten off.

“I can’t say with proof or anything,” Rousey added. “But if you look the exact same as you did when you were using, then what changed?”

Few athletes in mixed martial arts will ever experience a ride quite like the one Ronda Rousey is enjoying. Within a span of five years, Rousey has risen from relative obscurity to genuine international superstardom, paving the way for women to fight in the UFC while improbably becoming the highest-grossing draw in an otherwise male-dominated sport.

“I don’t even think I’m going to know what is going on right now or realize what is going on right now until afterward, until it’s all done,” Rousey reflected Monday on the Joe Rogan podcast.

“I could just try to do the best that I can in the moment, but I don’t really think that any of us really comprehend what’s going on right now until we’re looking at it in hindsight. And that’s the kind of thing, I think it’s kind of funny. There’s so many people who just live to hate me, but when I’m gone, they’re going to miss me. They really are.”

For Rousey (12-0), things only gets bigger from here. The UFC’s undefeated female bantamweight champion is slated to defend her title Nov. 15 against Holly Holm in front of a crowd of potentially 70,000 fight fans in Melbourne, Australia. If the event’s turnout matches expectations, UFC 193 would smash the promotion’s previous attendance record held by UFC 129.

But breaking records, it seems, is what Rousey does these days. Her latest title defense at UFC 190, a 34-second massacre over Bethe Correia, drew the highest pay-per-view marks of 2015 despite a lackluster undercard. The momentum for her global popularity ostensibly explodes with every successive fight, and even small things, such as her recent ‘Don’t be a DNB’ campaign, seemingly turn to gold overnight.

Though despite already being a cultural feminist icon and role model for young women, Rousey views herself in an interesting light.

“I’m not the protagonist. I’m the antagonist,” Rousey said. “Because the protagonist just reacts. They do nothing. The whole storyline, the whole everything that goes on, is completely dependent on the antagonist.

“I’m the one who’s forcing everybody to do something, and so I like to think of myself as more of the heel, the bad guy who you somehow sometimes root for. You can’t help it a little bit sometimes, but sometimes you hate them. I think the fact that mixed emotions come out is one of the more interesting things. I’m not trying to have everyone like me. I’m trying to have everybody care about what I’m doing.”

Between movies, marketing campaigns, and a tireless fight schedule, Rousey is perhaps the most sought after mixed martial artist since the heyday of Brock Lesnar. And yet her busy calendar rarely reflects itself in her fights. Of her 12 professional wins, 11 have ended inside the first round, the last four of which have ended in 66 seconds or less.

With those quick victories has come an aura that’s drawn repeated — and admittedly lazy — comparisons to Mike Tyson. In the mainstream media, Rousey fights have become bigger than any others.

That spotlight generates a unique pressure hard to describe for the uninitiated, and Rousey said that same pressure has become an advantage she can levy against opponents, most of whom are strangers to the bright lights.

“I notice a lot of these girls, they would like to win a UFC belt and have that respect, but they’re not about that life,” Rousey said. “They don’t want that life. They don’t want that attention, scrutiny, pressure, and constant work and all of those things. They don’t want it. They want one thing without the other, but it all comes together.

“And that’s I think one thing that’s kind of working against them, is when they actually come in to fight me, they get a taste, a small taste, of what that life is going to be like when they’re a contender — because it is way more attention, way more this, way more that. And once you win the belt, it’s just doubled every single time. It’s more and more and more and more. And I don’t think any of them would actually be happy with that lifestyle. I don’t think they really, truly want it.”

Rousey admitted that at some point within the next handful of years, she’ll have to sit down and ask herself what is next. If she continues to win, her portfolio of options outside the sport of MMA will only grow more lucrative, and Hollywood makes for a more comfortable lifestyle than getting punched in the face for a living.

But still, she can’t think about that yet, not while there’s still work to be done.

“It just seems unfinished. My career, there’s more left to do,” the 28-year-old said. “I don’t feel like I’m done yet. Because with the Olympics, it’s just like you win the gold medal and you’re done. With the UFC, when am I really done?

“But I’m not going to be doing this in my thirties,” Rousey added later. “I don’t want to be fighting into my thirties. By thirties, I mean like 31, 32.”

Aside from Holm, the most obvious mountain Rousey has yet to climb is the one rival who continues to float on the periphery like a thorn in the UFC champion’s side: Invicta FC featherweight standout Cristiane “Cyborg” Justino.

Rousey admitted that putting Justino behind her once and for all would “definitely” put her closer to feeling like she’s accomplished every she needs in the sport, and that if Justino “showed sooner rather than later,” Rousey isn’t sure how much longer she’d continue fighting once the rivalry was settled.

But Rousey also doubled down on her stance that the fight would have to be at 135 pounds, inferring that Justino is still taking performance enhancing drugs while backtracking away from directly accusing her.

“Someone who uses steroids and those kind of things, they need that to mentally think that they have an advantage that they didn’t earn,” Rousey said. “It’s a crutch for her. She needs to feel like she somehow has an advantage from the outside, because she doesn’t think she’s good enough with just what she has. That’s why you dope in the first place, because you feel like the best you have isn’t good enough. She feels like, if we fight fair, the best she has isn’t going to be good enough. That’s why she wants it to be somehow stacked in her favor.

“That’s the thing, when you look at these people from before, when they’re using, and after, when they’re not, they look entirely different. And ‘Cyborg’ looks and weighs exactly the same. If she gets off, it’ll be very easy for her to make weight, from what we’ve seen with every single other person that’s gotten off.

“I can’t say with proof or anything,” Rousey added. “But if you look the exact same as you did when you were using, then what changed?”