On Saturday, the usually outspoken Ronda Rousey returns to the UFC. This time, though, her lips are sealed.
In a six-month window, Rousey and Conor McGregor, arguably the two biggest stars in mixed martial arts history, both suffered devastating losses.
In the immediate aftermath of McGregor’s first UFC defeat at the hands of Nate Diaz, the silver-tongued Irishman faced the media, vowed to avenge the loss, actually completed that objective, then made history by becoming the first two-weight world champion in the Nevada-based promotion’s 23-year history.
Conversely, after Holly Holm punted Rousey in the face, the once-invincible champ avoided the press, and essentially went into hiding for 12 months.
In that year-long span, Rousey has only sporadically spoken out – once for a high-profile interview on The Ellen Show, and once for a fluff piece by ESPN.
Even on fight week, Rousey is all-but-refusing to show her face in public. She will do no media, and her only public appearance before the fight will be at weigh-ins.
The problem with that is, UFC 207 is an event in desperate need of promotion given that the event will air live on Saturday afternoon (Friday night – US time), a day earlier than usual.
We are all creatures of habit and fight fans Down Under have been conditioned to believe that UFC events air on Sunday afternoon and that minor calendar shift can have a huge effect on the buy rate.
The last time UFC experimented with a Friday night pay-per-view before New Year’s Eve, it tanked.
The event also featured a pay-per-view juggernaut in Brock Lesnar, who had his final UFC fight for almost five years against Dutch kickboxer Alistair Overeem, but the event underperformed, especially by Lesnar standards.
Pay-per-view buys for events headlined by Lesnar:
UFC 91 (vs. Randy Couture): 1.01 million buys
UFC 100 (vs. Frank Mir): 1.6 million buys
UFC 116 (vs. Shane Carwin): 1.16 million buys
UFC 121 (vs. Cain Velasquez): 1.050 million buys
UFC 141 (vs. Alistair Overeem): 535,000 buys
Even beyond the box office appeal, there are a bunch of unanswered questions circling Rousey heading into this weekend’s fight against UFC bantamweight queen Amanda Nunes.
The only journalist who has been given access to Rousey since Holm knocked her block off is ESPN’s Ramona Shelburne and the long form piece she produced felt like a story on Rousey’s terms, touching only on her redemptive story.
The elephant in the room when it comes to Rousey returning to the cage is her blinding loyalty to head coach Edmond Tarverdyan.
Aside from Rousey, nobody in the UFC has prospered under Tarverdyan. Rousey’s significant other, Travis Browne, is on a losing streak, Jake Ellenberger has gone 1-3 in his last four, and of the other three fighters that formed the ‘Four Horsewomen’ – Shayna Baszler, Jessamyn Duke and Marina Shafir – none have recorded a win over the past few years.
Of course, this was never addressed in the ESPN story.
Rousey’s silence has allowed her reemergence to be shrouded in a layer of mystery. The truth is, nobody has an inkling as to how the UFC’s poster girl will perform in the cage until the Octagon’s chain-linked door panel slams shut on Saturday.
Until that moment, she both is and isn’t a dominant wrecking machine.
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