Holm: Rousey loss would be positive for WMMA
Holly Holm on challenger to Ronda Rousey: “I think it’s kind of hard when people get in there and stare across the ring and think, ‘Wow, can I really beat her?'”
UFC women’s bantamweight champion Ronda Rousey has been beating up her challengers so definitively that UFC president Dana White joked she would have to start fighting men soon. However, former women’s boxing champion Holly Holm makes her UFC debut vs. Raquel Pennington at UFC 184 on Feb. 28 in Los Angeles.
The fight is a co-main. Rousey vs. Cat Zingano is the main event. A dominating performance by Holm, in a fight that is by no coincidence back to back, would make her a natural title challenger. Holm, 33, is 7-0 with six knockouts.
Further, Holm believes a Rousey loss would be positive for women’s MMA.
“I think it would benefit greatly,” said Holm to Mark Raimondi for MMAFighting.com in a recent interview. “I think when you see one person do well or kind of bring down the No. 1, then everybody thinks, well if she can do that, I can, too.”
“I think it kind of brings that person down to a normal level. Look at Anderson Silva. He almost seemed impossible to stop. When it happened, it was like, ‘Well, he is beatable.’ It’s hard to beat him. He’s seriously one of the greatest of all time. But it’s possible.”
“Ronda has run through everybody in the division. So I think it’s kind of hard when people get in there and stare across the ring and think, ‘Wow, can I really beat her?’ And you really have to believe you can or else you’re not going to be able to do it. She’s going to be hard to beat. There’s no bones about it. But you also can’t put her on a pedestal so high that you don’t believe you can do well also.”
However, for Holm to earthquake the sport and beat Ronda Rousey, she of course has to soundly beat Pennington next Saturday.