Holly Holm: You Can’t Put Ronda Rousey On A Pedestal So High

Heading into her UFC 184 match-up against No. 1 contender Cat Zingano on February 28, undefeated UFC women’s bantamweight champion Ronda Rousey has decimated all of her previous competition, and she’s looked nothing less than destructive and dominant in doing so.

While it’s true that Zingano could present the biggest challenge to Rousey’s throne, it would be a far more likely outcome (at least to most) if she simply showed up at the Staples Center and finished off ‘Alpha’ like she has everyone else.

Yet former women’s boxing champion Holly Holm, who will finally make her awaited UFC debut against Raquel Pennington in the co-main event of UFC 184, is rooting for the underdog. She told MMA Fighting that a Zingano win would go far in giving the women’s bantamweight division the shakeup that it needs:

“I think it would benefit greatly. I think when you see one person do well or kind of bring down the No. 1, then everybody thinks, well if she can do that, I can, too.”

Holm noted that Rousey has largely ran through top opposition, which has in turn lent her an aura of invincibility that could have her opponents beat before the fights even start:

“Ronda has run through everybody in the division,” Holm said. “So I think it’s kind of hard when people get in there and stare across the ring and think, Wow, can I really beat her? And you really have to believe you can or else you’re not going to be able to do it. She’s going to be hard to beat. There’s no bones about it. But you also can’t put her on a pedestal so high that you don’t believe you can do well also.”

We’ve seen a similar set of circumstances in the prime of all-time great Anderson Silva’s career, where his air of greatness intimidated opponents for years until it was all ripped away two years ago. Holm predicts that could happen to Rousey if she were to lose one single fight:

“I think it kind of brings that person down to a normal level,” Holm said. “”Look at Anderson Silva. He almost seemed impossible to stop. When it happened, it was like, ‘Well, he is beatable.’ It’s hard to beat him. He’s seriously one of the greatest of all time. But it’s possible.”

Although it’s been difficult for most MMA fans to see ‘The Spider’ go on a sort of downward spiral ever since his UFC 162 loss to Chris Weidman, it’s undeniable that the UFC middleweight division now has a newfound attitude of competitiveness that just wasn’t there when Silva dominated the top spot for so long.

Perhaps that scenario could benefit women’s MMA, as well.

But with Rousey the top female star in the UFC and arguably their biggest star overall, that’s probably not what they’ll be rooting for. Still, Zingano is no easy task, and even if ‘Rowdy’ gets by ‘Alpha,’ she’ll have potential fights with ‘Cyborg’ and possibly even Holm waiting in the wings.

Do you want to see Rousey lose and shake up the division? Is it even possible?