Ronda Rousey rarely looks back on the end of her MMA career, but that has started to change for the UFC Hall of Famer in the years since her final fight in 2016.
Rousey infamously walked away from the sport following back-to-back knockout losses at the hands of Holly Holm and Amanda Nunes. At the time, “Rowdy” took the losses hard. Following the Holm loss, she admitted to experiencing suicidal thoughts and questioning her self-worth if she was no longer seen as a UFC champion. Rousey eventually gave up on professional wrestling less than one year after the loss. She is currently the WWE SmackDown women’s champion.
During a Tuesday interview with Daniel Cormier, a fellow UFC Hall of Famer for his YouTube Channel , Rousey opened up a little bit about that period in her life.
” I think it was hard [to quit] in both judo, and MMA in that everybody else wanted more of me,” Rousey said. “Like, in judo you peak in your mid-20s. I medaled at 21 so I was going to be 25 for the next Olympics. Everyone’s like, ‘Oh, this is it! You’re going to be the first [American woman] to win an Olympic gold!’ And I didn’t want it anymore, and I couldn’t do it for everybody else.
” I believe that was a mistake I made with MMA. When I felt that it wasn’t for me anymore, I continued to do it for everyone .”
Rousey didn’t specify when it was in her UFC run that she realized her passion for the sport had started to wane, however she admitted that it took her end-of-career setbacks to finally understand that she was staying in the sport for all of the wrong reasons.
“I think to be at that top level, you kind of have to be a people pleaser,” Rousey said. You want your coach to be pleased, your parents to be happy, and you want everyone to enjoy your performance. And so it’s one of the things that makes you excel, but it’s one of those things that, it can be an obstacle a lot of times. It’s up to you to decide when it is time to leave. Not everyone else will agree. Nobody knows how you feel and what it takes.
” You’re an occasional novelty in TV, but that’s every day. And yeah, I think that setting boundaries with that relationship of everybody else, and not doing things for them and doing things for you, even though you won’t be understood, I think that was the hardest part — letting go of that need of feeling understood, because no one’s ever going to.”
No matter how Rousey’s MMA career ended, she remains a pioneer for UFC and a legend in the sport of fighting. Rousey was the first woman to be crowned UFC champion. She still holds UFC records such as the fastest title win, longest title finish streak, and second-longest consecutive streak of title defenses by a female fighter in UFC history. She was also one of the biggest mainstream stars the sport has ever produced.
But Rousey admitted that she has divorced herself so much from MMA these days that she didn’t even watch the latest shocker in her former division, when Julianna Pena stunned Nunes at UFC 269 to finally wrest away Rousey’s old UFC bantamweight belt.
“I honestly didn’t watch it,” Rousey said. “I don’t really watch fights anymore. Too many people are on each card and I end up getting hurt. It’s different if it’s like NASCAR, you know? Like, I don’t know any of these people and the cars smash and it’s like, ‘Woo! That’s great!
” I feel more for another person than myself. I hate losing so much more than I love winning. So I think that’s why, watching it, I feel more bad for the person who lost than good for the person who won — and as a net, I feel bad at the end of the day,” she continued.
“But [my husband former UFC fighter Travis Browne]is always like, “Fighting has so much of who and how we met,” and he’s trying to incorporate it more in our lives
Nonetheless, Rousey echoed previous sentiments that the one fight that would “mean so much” to her that it’d convince her to return to MMA would be a “dream matchup” against fellow trailblazer Gina Carano.
When asked earlier in the week about the possibility of a bout, Carano said she was open to it.
“You know what? “Just never think it through me,” Carano stated on FOX News. It could be .”
Rousey’s complete interview with Cormier can be watched below.
