Why do they stop the fights so quickly? I’m not into the UFC so i don’t know what they normally do. I see a bunch of dudes rolling around on the floor together. The chick went down, give her a standing 8 count and get it going again. Although even those 34 seconds were better than 12 rounds of watching Mayweather run around the ring. Blah.
It's not boxing. In MMA if you go down and are unable to defend yourself even for a short amount of time, they stop the fight. Normally this is demonstrated by the opponent pummeling you while you are down and helpless. This time the ref did not let Rhonda do that. Usually they do allow it. But a faceplant with no hands to break the fall means you are OUT. Bethe's head hitting the mat woke her up.
In boxing, the opponent must go to a neutral corner. Not in MMA.
Once in a generation, special athlete... who fought what 12 times, 4 of them have lasted longer than a minute, and only one got out of the first round?
Bronze medal Judo Olympian, who destroyed Strikeforce MMA first, then became the first female ever to sign with UFC after Dana White, the owner of it, swore women would never compete in the UFC. And now she is its biggest draw and biggest star.
But if her competition can't get out of the first round, at what point do you question the legitimacy of the competition, instead of giving her these extreme superlatives?
They are yet to find a close second to Rousey, this is true. Will it ever happen, is the question. We didn't question Emmitt's opponents when no matter what they did, they still couldn't stop him. And many of us knew early on he was special, had we said all this about HIM in his third year most people would have laughed - it took TIME for that to become widely known and accepted. He still had to DO it and so does Rousey.
You don't win your first 9 MMA fights like Bethe did, without being pretty darned good. Rhonda's Judo expertise carried her through her first several fights, her ability to apply the armbar from nearly every position can't be dealt with as yet. But she has also upped her game, winning with head strikes and knees to the liver if need be. It's three times now we've seen this.
Her next fight against Miesha Tate will be quite telling. Tate has upped her own game significantly too and is back as the #1 contender in the Bantamweight division. Should be a doozy and can't wait, Miesha is the only fighter to give Rousey much trouble..
By the way Michael Irvin was there in Rio Sunday night, cheering Rousy on.
The card overall was a great one too, with several fights involving Brazilian legends of the sport like Bigfoot, Big and Little Nog, Shogun, it was just a great card and a very entertaining MMA night and well worth the $60.
