Shocking the World in Australia (UFC 193 Review)
The history of the UFC is full of great fighters who have won plenty of fights and continue to dominate everyone that is put in front of them.
Fighters like Anderson Silva, Georges St. Pierre, or Jon Jones all moved up the rankings to win the title and didn’t let it go for more than a few years.
As dominant as these fighters were in holding massive winning streaks there is a new fighter that seems to be eclipsing all of them fast.
Ronda Rousey doesn’t have the same size of winning streak and she certainly hasn’t been in the game as long as any of those other fighters.
Many would say that she doesn’t yet belong among those fighters as she hasn’t won enough title fights to earn that standing.
That’s not entirely accurate though as she may not have the fight experience but there has been no champion as dominant as her.
The fights involving Rousey don’t last long as she has only ever gone out of the first round in two fights.
Her last four fights don’t even add up to a round of fighting and no matter what challenge they throw at her Rousey seems to come through with little question as to how dominate she is as a champion.
That is what makes her one of the all-time great champions in UFC history and as she entered UFC 193 a new chapter was ready to be written in her reign in the bantamweight division.
She has set the standard for champions and for women in the UFC as people want to see that level of fighter holding the title.
One fighter looking to meet that standard is Joanna Jędrzejczyk who came out of nowhere to earn the strawweight title earlier this year.
Often Jędrzejczyk is the forgotten champion in the second women’s division with Rousey taking so much focus but the strawweight champion is on her way to becoming a new Rousey.
There haven’t been many fighters that have challenged the Polish fighter aside from her first UFC fight against Claudia Gadelha.
Her two title fights were strong showings as she beat the first strawweight champion, Carla Esparza, and Jessica Penne both with TKOs.
The last fight was brutal as Jędrzejczyk beat up on Penne in a true showing of how dominant her stand-up game can be compared to the other fighters.
Jędrzejczyk doesn’t have the experience that Rousey has and has been as impressive mainly because she has only fought three times in the UFC.
She still has the potential to be the new Rousey and now gets a chance to show the world what she has in the biggest fight of her life.
Everyone tuned in and bought a ticket to see Rousey but Jędrzejczyk was right there waiting to show what she had in the co-main event.
It was always going to be a test though as Jędrzejczyk had never faced another high level striker like herself during her title fights.
Valérie Létourneau meant a different challenge for Jędrzejczyk and if she could win it was going to be an announcement to everyone that she was ready to begin a big run through the rest of the division.
The fight itself was far closer than anyone had expected as Letourneau put up a fight and challenge the champion every step of the way.
Letourneau was will to stand and trade with Jędrzejczyk and for the champion it is a recipe for a long night that she has seen before.
Although Letourneau kept the fight close Jędrzejczyk was just too much for the Canadian and Jędrzejczyk took home the unanimous decision win and remained the champion.
Now Jędrzejczyk will likely move on to face Claudia Gadelha who lost to Jędrzejczyk but in a fight that some thought Gadelha should have won in what could be a great match-up.
With the revelation of the strawweight division people realized that there was more than one great women’s division the focus turned to what everyone was there to see.
Rousey was set to take on her latest challenger in Holly Holm who by all accounts was the biggest test in Rousey’s career.
After all Holm had won everything a woman can win in boxing and had the same level of success in kickboxing while once again translated to a 9-0 MMA record.
She was looking to take that technique for the stand-up against Rousey and end the reign of the dominant champion.
Then again the story of a fighter bringing in a new challenge had been seen before and yet Rousey had never been beat.
This time that thought turned out to be more accurate than anyone could ever think and partly because of a bad gameplan by Rousey.
The smart move was to take Holm, a champion boxer and kickboxer, to the ground where Rousey is a far better fighter.
Rousey seemed to listen to her own hype though and seemed to believe that she could stand with someone who has been boxing for their entire life.
Instead of taking the fight to the ground Rousey stood up and traded with Holm who handed Rousey her first lost round after beating up on the champion with great straight rights.
In the second round Holm continued to punish Rousey on the feet and eventually landed a big head kick that sent Rousey to the ground and the entire UFC promotion on its head.
Rousey had lost for the first time in her career and all of a sudden one of the most dominant fighters in UFC history was no longer a champion.
Holm took the win and the title shocking the world and changing the title holder for the first time in the history of the division.
A rematch is almost guaranteed depending on how quickly Rousey wants to return, she said she wanted to take a break and return for UFC 200 in July 2016.
Losing her title might change those plans as she likely wants to get back in the octagon as soon as possible to get the title back and that is most likely Holm’s first title defence.
It was a shocking night where the reign of a champion that nobody thought could lose ended and it changed the look of the UFC for the foreseeable future.
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