Who would have thought that one could find romance in the up-and-down, rough-and-tumble world of fighting?
Fighters tend to enjoy dating other fighters; maybe it’s the fact that it’s a tough lifestyle for a non-fighter to adjust to, with long hours of training and travel that just makes it easy to date someone of common interest.
Whatever the reason, fighters and other big-name personalities surrounding the sport have coupled up more often than you think, so here are the 10 hottest couples in MMA:
10. Travis Browne & Ronda Rousey
Perhaps these two could be higher on the list, but these two aren’t active in MMA at the current time.
But Rousey was once MMA royalty, so by extension “Hapa” was one half of MMA’s hottest power couple.
Although they ultimately found love, things took an unexpected turn when the two took their talents to Glendale Fighting Club. Under Edward Tarverdyan’s tutelage, Browne and Rousey began losing fights consistently, and “Rowdy” couldn’t mentally handle defeat. “Hapa,” too, is on the worst skid of his MMA and UFC career and has been violently finished in all of his recent losses.
Now, Ronda is in the WWE and Browne has still yet to fight or have a fight scheduled since his last defeat to Oleksiy Oliynyk in July 2017.
Derrick Lewis once called out former opponent Travis Browne for allegedly hitting women, and now he’s calling out former NFL player-turned-mixed martial artist Greg Hardy. Lewis recently discussed Hardy’s upcoming professional MMA debut, which will be under Dana White’s Contender Series with TMZ Sports, and as usual, he didn’t hold back when it came to Hardy’s […]
Derrick Lewis once called out former opponent Travis Browne for allegedly hitting women, and now he’s calling out former NFL player-turned-mixed martial artist Greg Hardy.
Lewis recently discussed Hardy’s upcoming professional MMA debut, which will be under Dana White’s Contender Series with TMZ Sports, and as usual, he didn’t hold back when it came to Hardy’s history of domestic abuse.
“He’s a wife beater, I’d like to get in there with him. I like knocking wife beaters out. I’ll fight Greg Hardy. It’ll be like vice versa him beating on a woman. I’ll be beating him like he was a woman.”
”I grew up watching my mom and my stepdad fight just about every single damn day. Fist fighting every day for stupid stuff. I don’t tolerate stuff like that at all.”
Hardy was infamously charged with domestic violence against a girlfriend back in 2014, which ultimately cost him his NFL career. Lewis had brought up Browne’s history of violence towards women leading into their February 2017 fight. There, ‘The Black Beast’ knocked out ‘Hapa’ with punches in the second round.
Hardy is 3-0 as an amateur with all three victories coming by way of first-round knockout.
Would you be interested in a Lewis vs. Hardy fight should Hardy continue his ascent up the MMA ladder?
When is enough enough? For many of the best MMA fighters, that’s the toughest question to answer when it comes to ending their own careers in the cage. Whether it’s due to their natural fighting instincts, their continued need to make ends meet, a stubborn refusal to accept that their time has come and gone, […]
When is enough enough? For many of the best MMA fighters, that’s the toughest question to answer when it comes to ending their own careers in the cage.
Whether it’s due to their natural fighting instincts, their continued need to make ends meet, a stubborn refusal to accept that their time has come and gone, or just scant regard for their own well-being, many veteran stars end up delaying the inevitable far longer than they should.
The consequences for that can be devastating, and in this article, we’ll look at 10 high-profile UFC stars who have already traveled far down that path as they continue to put their long-term health and legacies at risk by delivering subpar performances and enduring repeated beatdowns in the Octagon.
Fighting is a fast-paced, notoriously unforgiving contest.
To be clear, we, as fans and/or writers can never tell a fighter when he or she should hang up their gloves, but at a certain point, it becomes difficult to watch our once-great idols sustain what could be life-altering trauma, and that pales in comparison to the heartache suffered by that fighter and their own family. With that said, let’s take a look at 10 formerly elite combatants who could avoid all (or at last most) of that by walking away right now.
Diego Sanchez
For many years, Sanchez was hailed as having one of the best chins in the game, holding a proud record of having only being stopped once (due to a cut) in 34 fights stretched over a 14-year period, despite having been in numerous brutal and bloody battles from featherweight all the way up to middleweight.
Then in July of 2016 at the historic UFC 200 event, his chin finally gave way when Joe Lauzon flattened him in just 86 seconds.
Though he did win his next fight, worse was to come in 2017 as Sanchez suffered back-to-back knockouts against Al Iaquinta and Matt Brown in a matter of minutes.
Even before this recent decline, Sanchez’s penchant for slugfests had led to concerns that he was taking too much punishment in the Octagon, and if it hadn’t been for highly controversial split decision victories over Takanori Gomi and Ross Pearson, he would have been on a six-fight losing streak from 2012-2015.
Nevertheless, the 35-year-old warrior’s fighting spirit still burns bright and so he’s vowed not to retire, and unfortunately, with his record showing that he’s never lost more than two fights in a row, he’ll likely be allowed to continue to compete even though it’s clearly against his best interests.
Former UFC female bantamweight champion Ronda Rousey appears to be headed to the WWE. In an interview with TMZ Sports, Rousey refused to confirm a report that she has signed with the pro wrestling promotion. Instead, teasing the notion of something happening soon. “If you were a real fan, would you really wanna know?” Rousey […]
Former UFC female bantamweight champion Ronda Rousey appears to be headed to the WWE. In an interview with TMZ Sports, Rousey refused to confirm a report that she has signed with the pro wrestling promotion. Instead, teasing the notion of something happening soon. “If you were a real fan, would you really wanna know?” Rousey […]
Ronda Rousey is remaining mum on her perceived World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) debut. The legendary former UFC women’s bantamweight champion, who has largely stayed out of the public eye as she’s abandoned fighting for a future with husband Travis Browne, has been rumored to be making her pro-wrestling debut soon after appearing at a few […]
Ronda Rousey is remaining mum on her perceived World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) debut.
The legendary former UFC women’s bantamweight champion, who has largely stayed out of the public eye as she’s abandoned fighting for a future with husband Travis Browne, has been rumored to be making her pro-wrestling debut soon after appearing at a few of former teammate Shayna Baszler’s matches for WWE.
When ‘Rowdy’ was asked about the topic by TMZ, she said that she wouldn’t reveal any of the juicy details, because as a longtime pro-wrestling fan herself, she wouldn’t want to know before it happened:
“If you were a real fan, would you really wanna know? I enjoy it more that way and I don’t wanna ruin anything.”
If and when she does make a more prolonged appearance in the WWE after appearing at WrestleMania in 2015, Rousey may do so alongside her UFC heavyweight husband “Hapa,” whose once-skyrocketing MMA career has taken a severe turn for the worst after four straight losses in the octagon.
When he was asked about his future, Browne also remained coy, but also would not say no to WWE if they came calling:
“We’re still making decisions on my part. I’m not gonna say no.”
Are you excited to watch Rousey – and potentially Browne – competing inside the squared circle?
UFC fighter