If you’ve been trying to read the tea leaves on whether or not Ronda Rousey will return to the UFC following her 48 second loss to champ Amanda Nunes, it’d be near impossible to interpret the results as anything but a resounding no.
The start of March marks three months since her defeat, and during that time she hasn’t made a public peep (recent sightings at Standing Rock were meant to be kept secret). UFC president and close friend Dana White has also been saying she just doesn’t have it any more, and when you have the guy making scads of cash off her saying she’s probably done, that doesn’t inspire confidence.
But on Sunday, Rousey posted an inspirational image to her Instagram that has fans buzzing.
“A ship in the harbor is safe, But that’s not what ships are for.”
The implications, for fans that want to read it a certain way, is that a fighter may not risk losing outside the cage, but fighters are meant to be in the cage. Of course, this could apply to so many other aspects of Rousey’s life. We just assume it’s about cagefighting because that’s how we see her now. But as mentioned last week, she’s already picking up roles in high profile TV shows. Maybe that’s how she plans on taking her ship out of harbor?
A return sure would be cool, though. She could take some inspiration from her boyfriend and UFC heavyweight Travis Browne, who just dropped a KO loss to upstart Derrick Lewis last weekend. It took Browne all of a day to announce he was disappointed but looking forward to getting back into the cage to fight again, despite all the nasty internet memes being made about him and his relationship with Rousey.
But let’s be realistic: this is the first potentially positive indicator that Ronda may come back, after months of big neon signs clearly pointed in the no direction. What a strange MMA world we live in where another Ronda Rousey fight is less likely than a Conor McGregor versus Floyd Mayweather boxing match.
