Ronda Rousey is one of the most popular and successful mixed martial artists of all time, having defended the women’s bantamweight title six times in the UFC. However, since her last bout at UFC 207 in 2016, Rousey has largely stayed away from the promotion. Her former opponent, Miesha Tate, believes Rousey is still bitter about the way her career ended.
In an interview with MMA on SiriusXM, Tate, the No. 9-ranked women’s bantamweight, said: “It certainly seems like she’s holding on to the resentment, the frustration, the anger and allowing it to dictate her next move. I personally do not think that the MMA community, in large part, ever turned their back on Ronda… She forgot that there were hundreds of thousands of little girls around the world that were still idolizing her. They didn’t care if she won or she lost. They thought she was amazing either way… I think she’s still really hurt by it, but I think she’s still very focused on self, instead of self-growth.”
Tate added: “Nobody gets away unscathed in this life, much less if your life is put on a magnitude scale where everybody gets to witness your rise, but they witness your fall, but this happens to every champion. This is not a Ronda Rousey versus the world situation. When you are great, sometimes people just want to see greatness fall, but that’s not the majority. Most people are healthy individuals living their life and they were wanting her to continue her success and they enjoyed it and those people were forgotten about and that’s just kind of sad, you know?”
Rousey defeated Tate via first-round submission to capture the Strikeforce women’s bantamweight title in 2012. The two later clashed at UFC 168 the following year, with Rousey defending her women’s bantamweight title via third-round submission.
In a recent interview, Rousey revealed why she has not attended UFC events since leaving the promotion in 2016. She claimed that the MMA media has “vilified” her and that she is “not really welcome back” because she believes she would be booed if she walked into the arena.
