The Question: Does Ronda Rousey Have a Future in MMA After UFC 207?
In 2015, Ronda Rousey had the whole world's attention. She was demolishing foes in a way never seen before. She was setting pay-per-view records. She was main-eventing shows around the world.
She was an unstoppable force unlike anything ever seen before in mixed martial arts. Then she suffered a devastating loss to Holly Holm at UFC 193 in Melbourne, Australia.
It's been over a year since that night, and while the details of Rousey's return are set in stone—she will face Amanda Nunes on Friday at UFC 207 in Las Vegas—the fight is still a mystery in almost every way. How will Rousey look as a fighter? Will she be technically on-point after the first long layoff of her career? Can she endure Nunes' heavy hands?
.jpg?w=256 "Colts Jaguars Football")
Possibly the biggest question, however, isn't about the fight itself. It's what comes after.
Rousey, despite coming off a loss and having an uncertain future, is one of the biggest draws in MMA at a time when the UFC is desperately seeking star power. The former champion is a precious, indispensable commodity for the new ownership group, but she remains an in-demand personality with suitors in Hollywood, Stamford and Las Vegas alike.
So, is Rousey in MMA for the long haul? Or is UFC 207 the penultimate station on the midnight train to retirement? Bleacher Report's Patrick Wyman is joining me to discuss that topic.
Steven Rondina: Well, Patrick, we are just a few days away from Ronda Rousey’s long-awaited return, and there are a lot of questions about the UFC 207 main event, ranging from the X's and O's of how she matches up against Amanda Nunes to abstract ideas such as her mental state entering fight night. Those are all discussions worth having, but I have been wondering something else: What comes after Friday for Rousey?
She, to her credit, seems to be 100 percent business entering this weekend. There has been a boatload of discussion about how she has been "avoiding the media," but judging from the pre- and post-UFC 202 Conor McGregor, that hermitage is likely to end with a victory. But what form will that take?
Hollywood, at least to some degree, is still interested in Rousey, and the former champ herself has suggested that, win or lose, she might be done with MMA. Still, the money is way bigger in prizefighting than acting for Rousey. And while she may have been finger-wagging at Floyd Mayweather Jr. about his money-focused lifestyle, according to ESPN The Magazine (via MMA Fighting), Ronda's not fighting—or doing those MetroPCS commercials—for free.
So, Patrick, I have to ask you. Is 207 going to be Rousey's swan song? Or will she stick around for much longer?
Patrick Wyman: Win or lose, I doubt this will be Rousey's last time in the Octagon. If she loses, those Hollywood deals could well dry up, since they were predicated on a particular image of Rousey as an unstoppable pop culture phenomenon. Another loss, especially the kind of brutal knockout Nunes could give her, could be the end of anything like Rousey the movie star.
When I talked to WWE maestro and genius marketer Paul Heyman about Rousey last year, he pointed to at least six different narratives through which Rousey could be sold to the public. Her dominance, however, was the easiest of those to grasp and the most essential. That was the single thing every other meaningful narrative about her—female empowerment, her life story, Rousey as cultural phenomenon—was built on. Without dominance in the cage, are the other angles even interesting to a general audience?
In that scenario, the money will eventually bring her back to prizefighting unless she's content to live a lifestyle that involves nothing more expensive than playing World of Warcraft all day.
If she wins, though, it will be hard for her to turn down millions of dollars, potentially tens of millions, to stay in the UFC. A rematch with Holly Holm could loom at either 135 or 145 pounds, and there's always the Armageddon scenario of a fight with Cris Cyborg to consider. The latter is arguably the single biggest fight the UFC could put together right now.
I only see one real chance that UFC 207 is her last fight: If she's really, truly, 100 percent sick of everything MMA has to offer and is willing to take the potential hit to her acting career that leaving the original source of her stardom behind would entail.
What do you think, Steven? Is Rousey so sick of MMA that win or lose, she's out of the game? Would another loss tarnish her for good?
Steven: Was Rousey sick and tired of MMA ahead of UFC 193? I think so. Has that changed after over a year without a professional fight? That's tough to say, but I'd wager not.
Either way, I agree she'll likely come back again, win or lose. The bucks are just too big to pass up, and they'll eclipse whatever she could possibly make in Hollywood.
For the sake of comparison, Seth Rogen and James Franco were paid $8.4 million and $6.5 million, respectively, for their starring and creative contributions in The Interview, according to information obtained by Bloomberg (via Variety). That's significantly more than Rousey could hope to make at any point in the near future—and much less than what she's capable of making in MMA. And, while this isn't an apples-to-apples comparison, Gina Carano should be a cautionary tale about how quickly an acting career can go sideways.
If Rousey loses, I think she will disappear for another year, maybe a year-and-a-half, and come back for a legitimate tune-up fight. If she wins? Then she probably comes back sooner.
The only X-factor I see in there would be the WWE snatching her up for WrestleMania, and that feels like a long shot. Do you agree?
Patrick: The conundrum for Rousey is her value as an actress is predicated on her stardom, and her stardom comes from being in the spotlight and dangerous. If she's losing fights, especially in devastating fashion, and then shutting herself away for extended periods, it's hard to maintain the public image of a dangerous person.
If we're correct that Rousey doesn't want to be in MMA for the long haul, going to WWE would be an elegant solution in the short or medium term. She wouldn't have to put herself through a punishing training camp or an unwelcome media schedule. But she'd still be in the public eye and be able to project the image of a dangerous person.
In that scenario, Rousey could likely secure for herself the kind of limited schedule former UFC heavyweight champion Brock Lesnar has carved out, avoiding the day-to-day grind of travel and in-ring performance that plagues the wrestling industry while focusing on the biggest shows.
This would be a huge coup for WWE, a steady and lucrative paycheck for Rousey and a way of maintaining the public interest necessary to slide into the occasional film that suits her talents. If the right matchup in the UFC came along, she could be there for that as well.
I've managed to talk myself into this, Steven, but you're the wrestling expert here. Does this make sense? And how much would her stardom diminish should she lose to Nunes at UFC 207?
Steven: I'm flattered to be labelled a "wrestling expert," but that's undeserved praised for someone working alongside Jonathan Snowden, Mike Chiappetta and Chad Dundas, who have written the proverbial (and literal) books on professional wrestling. Still, I know enough to say Rousey wouldn't necessarily fit well into WWE's pay structure.
For the sake of comparison, Conor McGregor told reporters he was poised to make $40 million in 2016 ahead of UFC 205.
Seth Rollins, who held the WWE World Heavyweight Championship for much of 2015 and main-evented a number of pay-per-views during that time, was paid just $2.4 million annually, according Forbes' Chris Smith. Neither of those numbers is necessarily 100 percent accurate, but, regardless, there's a big difference there.
Unless Rousey is willing to work on the cheap or the WWE is willing to rile up a lot of its regular performers, I don't see her sticking around in wrestling for anything more than an appearance or two for an event like WrestleMania.
It's possible, sure—the WWE is openly courting Rousey, and she is a lifelong wrestling fan who told reporters in 2015 that she wanted to be the Divas Champion. But it wouldn’t be wise for ol' Vince McMahon to break the bank for someone who hasn't ever cut a WWE promo or worked a match.
Ultimately, though, I don't see her potential wrestling career or her still-amorphous acting career as anything more than detours on her MMA path. As you mentioned, her persona is built around her status as an in-cage assassin. That applies to everything she's done in Hollywood to this point and anything she might do in the immediate future.
While Rousey is the first person in MMA history to transcend the UFC, she hasn't transcended the fact that she is a fighter. Even when she does appearances on mainstream outlets, she's jacking up Jimmy Fallon’s elbow or smacking a fake Justin Bieber in the face.
Two years removed from her role in The Expendables 3, she hasn't pulled a Dwayne Johnson, and I'm not sure she can. Hollywood has few opportunities for women who don't comfortably fit into the "20-something-year-old magazine editor" role, and unless she can miraculously post a breakout performance in a series of bit parts, her ceiling (and potential paydays) is comparatively low.
Granted, Rousey has likely made enough money to comfortably retire at this point, but the UFC needs her now more than it ever has. If her checks reflect that, then I don't see her going away anytime soon.
Patrick: Without being too down on her, none of Rousey's acting work has thus far shown her to be the second coming of Meryl Streep. I'm sure she's working on her skills, but she has a long way to go before she becomes more than competent on-screen. That's a powerful incentive to stay in MMA.
On the other hand, though, the Holm fight should have made us realize how much Rousey doesn't like to get hit. If the relatively pillow-fisted Holm could tag her hard enough to frustrate her, bust up her face and force her into an increasingly reckless style, Nunes' fists will introduce her to a whole new world of hurt.
And that's the basic problem here. Getting hit is just one unavoidable aspect of MMA that Rousey doesn't seem to enjoy, and it's indicative of her broader disenchantment with the sport. Unless she has reignited her love of fighting, I have a hard time seeing her stick around regardless of the money.
Steven: I'm not sold on the "Rousey doesn’t like getting hit" line of thinking. For better or worse, she ate Holm's hardest shots and never stopped moving forward...albeit into more punches and kicks. Fighters who truly "can’t take a punch," as social media naysayers would put it, usually don't keep plodding at their foes with reckless abandon. I'd chalk up her loss to Holm to a less than polished striking game and awful game-planning more than anything else.
Either way...I think her love of fighting has been reignited. Or, at the least, her drive is back.
We saw what an emotionally checked-out Rousey looked like ahead of UFC 193—exasperated, somewhat awkward but willing to go through the motions. Today's Rousey isn't any of those things. She seems focused and generally mad at the world. That has to be a scary thought for anyone in the UFC women's bantamweight division.
That won't necessarily translate to victory, of course. Nunes is the hardest puncher Rousey has faced to date, and that's not good for someone who has always had poor striking defense.
Still, there's no doubt in my mind that Rousey wants to get a win at UFC 207, and if she can pull it off, she'll want another in 2017.
.jpg?w=480 "Colts Jaguars Football")
