“I really feel like I’ve found my place and what I’m supposed to be doing. I feel like it’s better for all of us. This is my role for all the women in the division. It helps them all out that they all get to take their turns losing to me. They’ll all make a lot more money that way. After I retire and they fight each other, they’re not going to make as much money being the champion when I’m gone then they are being the contenders now… I really hope I deserve this. I’m trying my best to deserve it. I really, really am. Sometimes it’s just like that you kind of get wrapped up in how amazing this all is. You get so wrapped up in the fight and it causes so much fear and anxiety and stress in you. You kind of lose sight of how amazing it is sometimes. This fight has really been an opportunity to say that… If anything, I feel like they’ll appreciate me when I’m gone. Maybe not right now. But I feel like this is my purpose and I’m fulfilling it.”
-Ronda Rousey discusses what she believes to be her purpose right now in the sport during an open workout in Australia prior to Saturday’s UFC 193 event (transcribed by MMAFighting.com).
Penick’s Analysis: The money is definitely in Rousey as the Champion right now, but whether that’s truly benefiting the challengers she’s facing the way she believes may be up for debate. That’s entirely dependent on those challengers being able to negotiate with the UFC to get a bigger piece of whatever’s coming in these fights with Rousey, because that may not be the case, and if that’s not the case, then they might not be making what Rousey believes they are. With that said, the fight purses for women fighters are certainly higher in the UFC than most if not all of them would find elsewhere, and they’re in the UFC right now because of Rousey, so on some level there’s something to the talking point. Still, I’m not sure it’s necessarily as beneficial for her challengers as she makes it seem.
[Photo (c) Jason da Silva via USA Today Sports]
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