mma / Columns

MMA Media: It’s Time to Say Goodbye to Ronda Rousey

March 20, 2018 | Posted by Evan Zivin
Ronda Rousey WWE Elimination Chamber Image Credit: WWE

So what’s the deal with all this pro wrestling getting all up in my MMA?

We’ve got Daniel Cormier getting into feuds with wrestlers on Twitter. We’ve got Brock Lesnar, who is currently not at all a part of the UFC, teasing a return, as he usually does when his WWE contract is up for renewal. We’ve got headlines about fighters looking to get into wrestling when they retire, or right now, if Fabricio Werdum’s recent comments are to be believed (or if the bad translation of his comments are to be believed).

I will say, though, if Werdum wants to get into the WWE, his performance on Saturday against Alexander Volkov made for a great audition. It showed he can take a bump and do the job for the younger, better-looking guy. I like to believe that’s what he was doing. I don’t like the reality that a former UFC champion was, once again, not respecting his opponent’s skills and got caught swinging wildly with his chin out.

Seriously, “Vai Cavalo” may not be too off from a trip to the glue factory at this point…

And the biggest pro wrestling news that keeps cluttering up my MMA news feed, as barren and empty as it’s been these days. Is Ronda Rousey’s WWE debut and her road to Wrestlemania.

I’m not going to get into details about what she’s done in the WWE so far, although it hasn’t been much. She debuted in January, showing off her exemplary pointing skills, and has quickly been lumped into a match at Wrestlemania, teaming with Kurt Angle, the 1996 Olympic gold medalist who probably would have entered MMA if the money was there in the late 90s, against the evil authority of Triple H, a man USADA might like to have a few words with, and Stephanie McMahon, the Ivanka Trump of pro wrestling.

Now, I’ve been following the goings on of Rousey in the WWE but that’s only because I am a wrestling fan and, for as awful as the WWE’s programming has been for the last…ever, there’s still a part of me that derives amusement from it. Kinda like how it’s hard to turn away from a car crash, which is a fair assessment of Ronda in the WWE so far, but that’s not my story to tell.

Why? Because you didn’t come here to read about pro wrestling. You came here to read about MMA.

Or at least, I assume that’s why you’re here. I mean, it’s not like there’s a whole lot going on in the sport these days. This post McGregor era has been pretty limp and lifeless. Hell, most of the writers in the MMA Zone right now are MIA other than Plunkett, who will probably continue to write until the sun burns out, God bless his soul.

And we’re the suckers who write about this sport “for the love of it.” You go on the legitimate MMA news sites, sites where they pay people to do “journalism,” and you don’t see much better. For every profile on an up and comer and thorough analysis of the sport from those who have the ability and the resources to get up close to it, we get continuous articles about when Conor or CM Punk is going to fight again, pieces of content which offer little to no substance but are about fighters who the casual fan may care about because casual fans are the worst.

Hey, gotta get those clicks, right? Why else does it seem like so many sites keep writing about Ronda when 1) she’s not currently competing in MMA and 2) she’s not planning to compete in MMA anytime soon, if ever again.

And she all but admitted as much this past week when she appeared on The Ellen Show, her safe space for when MMA fans are too busy being haters, and said that, while she won’t retire, the odds of her taking another MMA fight is on par with the odds of her competing in judo again.

So she’s done. She ain’t coming back. That’s it.

That’s why I’m taking the time to tell the MMA media something that I shouldn’t need to tell them:

Stop it.

Just stop.

Seriously, it’s time to move on. She doesn’t like you anymore. She wants nothing to do with you. Just give it up and get on with your life.

And it’s not like any of this is a surprise. She’s been dodging MMA media since her loss to Holly Holm in 2015, even completing shutting the media out in the lead up to her (final) fight with Amanda Nunes in 2016.

She clearly wants nothing to do with you, MMA media. She’s already moved on. Why can’t you?

Seriously, how many more articles are going to be written about her wrestling exploits on MMA sites? How many more times will I have to read about Ronda bodyslamming Triple H or mean mugging the WWE cameras? I get that sharing the story probably results in the most clicks these sites get but is it their story to share? Doesn’t it hurt their integrity a bit to use a platform that was built to disseminate information on a legitimate sport to talk about a scripted one? Does anyone even care?

I know some do. There’s always that guy who rants in the comments section of these stories questioning why an MMA site is reporting on wrestling, which is usually followed by a commenter asking that commenter why they’re commenting on an article about wrestling on an MMA site when that commenter clearly doesn’t like the fact that there’s an article about wrestling on an MMA site and then it just gets messy from there.

Save us from the agony, MMA media. SAVE US!

I mean, if you’re going to keep writing about Rousey’s WWE tenure, does that mean you’re going to start writing about other former MMA fighters who wrestle? Are we going to get to learn what Minoru Suzuki and Suzuki-gun will do now after losing to Los Ingobernales de Japon? Or how well Matt Riddle matches up with Low Ki? Or the implications of Tom Lawlor and Seth Petruzelli slamming dudes hands into car doors and WHO KNOWS IF JEFF COBB WILL BE ABLE TO COMPETE IN TONIGHT’S BIG TAG MATCH BARBECUE SAUCE!!!!

Where does it end, MMA media? Where does it end? Can there be winners and losers here when the outcome is predetermined?

And I get that I’m being that guy, the one who expresses displeasure in something while talking solely about it. Maybe that’s the only way to make a valid point in some cases. Or maybe I’m desperate for the clicks too. All I know is I ain’t getting a cut of the ad revenue so it doesn’t really matter to me what you think about it.

There are a million places to go to read up on wrestling news. If you want to read about the pro graps, you know where to go. That’s why I don’t visit an MMA site to find out what John Cena’s Wrestlemania plans are. I go to find out what Dana White’s plans for the lightweight championship are.

I know that MMAFighting has Dave Meltzer as one of its staff writers and I know that MMA and pro wrestling have a shared history in many ways but let’s respect that fans who don’t follow both and keep a healthy amount of separation between the two. MMA fans go to MMA sites looking for news on MMA fighters, not pro wrestlers who used to fight MMA. I think that’s a fair distinction to make.

Or you can just ignore the fans who complain in favor of the ones who don’t care. That’s a valid option too, I guess.

At least we’re only days away from finding out who Punk is going to fight at UFC 225, right?

Is anybody else cold in this MMA Zone? It feels very cold in here. So cold…

Evan Zivin has been writing for 411 MMA since May of 2013. Evan loves the sport, and likes to takes a lighthearted look at the world of MMA in his writing…usually.

article topics :

Ronda Rousey, Evan Zivin