White: Ronda Rousey’s biggest issues were with the media, ‘she felt attacked’

Dana White thinks Ronda Rousey’s biggest issues during her layoff were with the media.

When Dana White announced that Ronda Rousey was returning to challenge for Amanda Nunes’ UFC belt, he said that the year layoff wasn’t due to any issues with her mentally.

“100 percent, it was never about a psychological problem with Ronda,” White told Colin Cowherd. “The thing with Ronda is, she wanted time off. She said she wanted to go away and relax. This girl worked hard for us for 3 years, non stop fight after fight, promotion after promotion, and she wanted time off.”

White said similar things with other outlets, saying that Rousey just really planned to have a layoff because of the busy schedule before the loss, and that she needed to take care of some minor injuries as well.

Earlier in the year though, Rousey herself opened up and admitted that losing was incredibly tough on her that she even contemplated suicide at one point.

When asked by Fox Sports’ Jan and Dan about this, and Rousey’s head not being in the right place after the loss, White gave a somewhat different answer.

“Ronda is so competitive. Who likes to lose? Nobody does, but she’s on the next level. I think she just wanted time,” White said. “She had issues. Her biggest issues, in my opinion, were with the media.”

“She just felt like the media completely turned on her when she lost. She felt attacked. She felt like these people in the media, that she gave three years of her life, cruising around, giving interviews to, completely turned on her when she lost.”

“I’ve been doing this for 16 years, and I’ve had my moments with the media,” he said. “The media can irritate you. If you go through something traumatic like she did losing, and you have to listen to some the things being written and said — I get it.”

Rousey returns at UFC 207 against Nunes, with a “possible” co-headlining title defense from Dominick Cruz as well.