Rousey and Tate were broke as a joke
Fighting to the best of your ability take enormous time and commitment. It hurts every day. Injuries are a given….
Fighting to the best of your ability take enormous time and commitment. It hurts every day. Injuries are a given. It starts in the amateurs, when there is no money. Then, when you first turn pro, you are an actual hundredaire. After expenses, you still have nothing.
Miesha Tate was working at McDonalds as an amateur, and when she turned pro, moved on to Costco. Tate lived in a mobile home, with her boyfriend, who is also a fighter. They had a roommate in the trailer. It was parked in the gym parking lot.
“We did that to cut costs so I wouldn’t have to work, so that I could dedicate only time to training and fighting,” Tate said. “I feel that was the right decision. It definitely paid off.”
Ronda Rousey, an Olympic medalist, was in similar straits. “I was working three jobs: graveyard shift at 24 hour fitness, physical therapy on dogs, teaching judo, remembers Rousey. I was trying to train full-time, the air-conditioning was broken in my car and only one window worked, I was living in a one bedroom apartment I was sharing with a friend of mine, I had a huge dog, everything was broken all the time, we had no water pressure, we were living off pretty much bomb shelter food, we had to use coins to pay rent, and I could barely feed my dog … I need to win and I need to do this quick because I’m tired of living with the cockroaches and eating frozen vegetables!
Rousey looks back on her poverty with disgust and is still flush with joy that she doesn’t have to work means-to-end jobs any more.
“I don’t have to sit around and listen to creeps all night long while I’m chugging down 7-Eleven coffee,” she said. “I don’t have to worry about going to McDonald’s and realizing I don’t have any cash in my wallet and realizing my credit card is maxed out and I can’t afford McDonald’s coffee.”
“I don’t have those problems any more, and all I have to do is have fun while talking to you guys. It’s not a real chore, is it?”
The difference in their approach to this fight is that Rousey is enjoying herself in the moment while Tate is saving up the negativity for when the punches start flying Saturday nght.