Has anyone else noticed the sudden undercurrent of opinion that maybe, just maybe, Ronda Rousey should fight a dude at some point? This is what comes of being too damn good. Fighting women your weight isn’t enough for fans anymore. Fighting women at all might not be enough!
UPROXX isn’t innocent in all of this. Leading up to her fight against Cat Zingano, we posted a list of men who Ronda Rousey could fight. Afterwards, we reported on Bovada Sports opening a betting line on Ronda fighting a guy before the start of 2017. That’s just far enough away to make many gambling addicts go “hmmmm.”
If Ronda ever does agree to fight a man (and that man isn’t Bryan Caraway), she’s got a willing participant in UFC flyweight fighter Ian McCall, who also noticed all the respectable voices in the MMA community hypothesizing about her chances against the male gender. He had this to say:
“They say all these comparisons to her fighting men,” said McCall. “Even like Joe [Rogan]. I need to have a conversation with Joe about it because she’s not beating up a man. I’m sorry, it’s not going to happen.”
…
“A good man will not lose to Ronda Rousey,” said McCall. “I could put a judo gi on, [she’s] an Olympian. You’re not throwing me. It’s not going to happen. I will throw you on your head. Pretty simple. And you weigh more than me.“I can’t compartmentalize it. It doesn’t make sense to me. I know it’s all talk. They compare her to [former heavyweight boxer Mike] Tyson. She’s dangerous, she’s good. I get it, but it’s just silly.”
“Ronda’s definitely not the best pound-for-pound fighter in the world,” said McCall. “She’s the best woman on the planet. That’s cute. Cool. Well, we’re doing men things.”
In 1997, when the UFC added weight classes, they used the reasoning, “Skill beats size, unless skill is equal. Then size wins.” Adding women into the mix complicates things because you can’t just boil things down to weight. There are differences in bone density and the way bodies hold mass and muscle. And men have a slight advantage in the fact that they, you know, have a sh*t ton of testosterone pumping through their bodies, unlike women. Which I hear helps.
Of course, Ronda isn’t your average woman. She still has all the same physical disadvantages as the average woman, but she’s also got a lifetime of hardcore Olympic-level judo training to boot. She rolls with men. She spars with men. Even though they have a size and strength advantage, her skill level is so high that many educated people in the fight biz still think she’d win in a Bobby Riggs vs. Margaret Court “Battle of the Sexes.”
I know who I’d put my money on if she ended up fighting Ian McCall.
https://youtu.be/QnP1G9Ym-Vs?t=3m30s
