Has Holly Holm even gotten to go home since defeating Ronda Rousey last week in Australia? It seems to us that the new UFC women’s bantamweight champion has been doing the talk-show circuit nonstop since taking out the queen with a brutal head kick. I guess the UFC figures if she can handle Rousey in the cage, she can handle Rousey’s media obligations.
Last night Holly was on Late Night with Seth Meyers and walked us through the half second when she knocked Ronda to the canvas and then followed up with the kick heard ’round the world:
“As soon as I saw her kinda standing back up, it was kinda a slow-motion moment right there. Like ‘Don’t kick her while her hands are on the canvas because that would be an illegal blow. Let’s not ruin this! We’re close, we’re so close, don’t ruin it.’ And then it was there so I just let it go.”
To which Seth Myers responded, “That’s fantastic. I mean, for you.” Less so for Ronda Rousey, who spent the evening having a plastic surgeon fix her mouth rather than stuffing it with buffalo wings, as is the norm after a victory.
There’s a lot of routines Rousey might be changing over the next six months. A lot of people are saying she shouldn’t even return to fighting, that a second loss will wipe out her fledgling Hollywood career. And if she does come back, it may have to be at a different gym. Not because she’s ditching her coach Edmond Tarverdyan, as so many are suggesting she does, but because he might end up losing his gym in a bankruptcy case.
And at the end of it all, Holly Holm will still be waiting for her in the cage, confident in knowing she’s got the tools to beat Rousey. If there’s any silver lining to Holm holding the belt instead of Ronda, it means at least she’ll be out on the road doing endless interviews like Rousey was. That much media is a challenge in and of itself, and it will be interesting to see how Holly handles it over the next six months.