{"id":671372,"date":"2026-05-14T23:18:11","date_gmt":"2026-05-14T23:18:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/671372\/"},"modified":"2026-05-14T23:18:11","modified_gmt":"2026-05-14T23:18:11","slug":"michael-irvin-changes-tune-on-mma-aspirations-after-watching-ronda-rousey-train","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/671372\/","title":{"rendered":"Michael Irvin Changes Tune On MMA Aspirations After Watching Ronda Rousey Train"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>                          Michael Irvin<br \/>\n                          Yeah, Never Mind On Taking An MMA Fight<br \/>\n                          &#8230; Ronda Scared Me Away!!!<\/p>\n<p>\n                                                                        Published<br \/>\n                              May 14, 2026<br \/>\n                            3:21 PM PDT\n                                                                            <\/p>\n<p>            Play video content<\/p>\n<p>                    <img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" loading=\"eager\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/208f369010e042b49116934746f1f5ae_md.jpg\" alt=\"michael-irvin-kal-05-14-2026\" width=\"728\" height=\"410\" class=\"img-fluid\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Once upon a time, Pro Football Hall of Famer Michael Irvin told TMZ Sports he was itching to get in the cage for an MMA fight &#8230; so does he still feel that way in 2026??<\/p>\n<p>Hell. No.<\/p>\n<p>            Play video content<\/p>\n<p>                    <img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/e26fd7fecc4b4285825e721a41d62160_md.jpg\" alt=\"michael-irvin-2017-clip-05-14-2026\" width=\"728\" height=\"410\" class=\"img-fluid\"\/><br \/>\n                      JULY 2017<\/p>\n<p>The 60-year-old Dallas Cowboys legend told Babcock nine years ago he&#8217;d love the opportunity to beat someone&#8217;s face in (professionally) &#8230; admitting he was already doing the training, so why not see what he can do??<\/p>\n<p><a id=\"continued\" class=\"continued-anchor\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Fast forward to Wednesday night &#8230; and Irvin walked back those comments after watching Ronda Rousey&#8217;s workout at Venice Beach ahead of her big bout with Gina Carano on Saturday.<\/p>\n<p>                  <a class=\"js-click-image js-track-link image-lightbox-preview\" data-node-ref=\"tmz:image-asset:image_png_20260220_2abebc510c8b46a4b8c510884ad68388\" data-container-ref=\"tmz:article:8a827817-8cf0-4993-b739-62c4f496c9af\" data-context=\"{&quot;section&quot;:&quot;permalink&quot;,&quot;name&quot;:&quot;image&quot;}\"><\/p>\n<p>                          <img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/2abebc510c8b46a4b8c510884ad68388_md.png\" alt=\"michael irvin sub getty 2\" width=\"728\" height=\"546\" class=\"img-fluid image-block__img-fluid img-aspect-auto\"\/><\/p>\n<p>                  <\/a><\/p>\n<p>He said he initially felt the urge to get in there &#8230;. but Rowdy ruined it.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;And then I saw Ronda on the mat &#8230; s***, boy, s*** I better not get in that ring with someone moving around like that,&#8221; Irvin said. &#8220;Man, it is amazing watching her up close like this &#8212; work that transitioning game on the mat like that.<\/p>\n<p>            Play video content<\/p>\n<p>                    <img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/b84b6b0f63e34316931f3dc95622c7f1_md.jpg\" alt=\"michael-irvin-ronda-rousey-workouts-05-14-2026\" width=\"728\" height=\"410\" class=\"img-fluid\"\/><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t know anybody in fighting period, even now to this day, that has that ability.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s scary &#8230; she&#8217;s a beast,&#8221; he added.<\/p>\n<p>Irvin might wanna stay away from Ronda, but he had a cool moment with his buddy, Nate Diaz &#8230; where the two chopped it up for a bit during his workout.<\/p>\n<p>Call us crazy &#8230; but Irvin&#8217;s still in incredible shape &#8212; if he ever wants to reconsider, we&#8217;re all for it!!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Michael Irvin Yeah, Never Mind On Taking An MMA Fight &#8230; Ronda Scared Me Away!!! Published May 14,&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":671373,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[570],"tags":[64,63,786,785,44,85,635,26898],"class_list":["post-671372","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mma","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-fighting","tag-mma","tag-news","tag-sports","tag-sports-news","tag-tmz-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/671372","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=671372"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/671372\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/671373"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=671372"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=671372"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=671372"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}