{"id":495379,"date":"2026-02-24T02:47:08","date_gmt":"2026-02-24T02:47:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/495379\/"},"modified":"2026-02-24T02:47:08","modified_gmt":"2026-02-24T02:47:08","slug":"ronda-rousey-fighting-in-two-crucial-battles-may-16-in-la","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/495379\/","title":{"rendered":"Ronda Rousey Fighting In Two Crucial Battles May 16 In LA"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ronda Rousey\u00a0<\/a>will be making a surprising MMA return in less than three months\u2019 time. On May 16, Rousey fights Gina Carano<\/a> in the headlining contest<\/a> of Jake Paul\u2019s Most Valuable Promotions\u2019 first-ever MMA event.<\/p>\n

This contest will be \u201cRowdy\u201d Ronda Rousey\u2019s first appearance under MMA rules since Dec. 30, 2016. In a rare Friday night event from the UFC, Rousey fought Amanda Nunes for the promotion\u2019s women\u2019s bantamweight championship.<\/p>\n

The final fight of the 2016 slate from the No. 1 MMA promotion in the world ended on a sour note for Rousey and her camp. Even though the fight was an advertised five rounds at five minutes per round inside the fabled Octagon inside T-Mobile Arena,<\/a> Nunes finished Rousey in under the first minute in the first round. The loss dropped her to 12-2 in MMA and 6-2 under the UFC banner.<\/p>\n

Ronda Rousey Part of Bigger War on May 16<\/p>\n

While the primary contest Rousey will appear in is against Gina Carano, this is only part of a larger-scale battle for her. Earlier Monday, Most Valuable Promotions released an episode of\u00a0MVP Uncut<\/a> concerning the Feb. 17 announcement.<\/p>\n

In the video, Ronda Rousey offered up her take on MVP promoting her fight against Carano on May 16, a five-round fight at five minutes per round in the women\u2019s featherweight division.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a dream fight and a superfight and everything,\u201d Ronda Rousey said of her fight against Gina Carano, \u201cbut I feel like the story and everything behind it is not just this fight. A lot of it is MVP vs. UFC. That\u2019s where I\u2019m going to go real hard, in the trenches.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Rousey vs. Carano Good News for Women\u2019s MMA<\/p>\n

Ronda Rousey is of the belief that her fight versus Carano in the second half of May will ultimately be of some benefit to Dana White\u2019s organization. She explained to MVP co-founder and CEO Nikisa Bidarian why this is the case.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re suffering from a lack of competition,\u201d she continued. \u201cThey can\u2019t just make a class-action lawsuit every couple of years, [it\u2019s] the cost of doing business. I\u2019m really trying to help Dana out. If anyone has been groomed to be his apprentice, it\u2019s been me, and I think I\u2019d be the most favorite adversary he\u2019s ever had.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ronda Rousey on Why MVP Promoting Fight is the Right Move<\/p>\n

In spite of Rousey\u2019s friendship with the UFC\u2019s CEO, she thinks that MVP made the best call in scheduling her contest with Carano for this spring. She pointed to Jake Paul\u2019s 2024 exhibition boxing match with Mike Tyson as the rationale.<\/p>\n

\u201cTyson vs. Paul was, what, the most-viewed fight ever?,\u201d Rousey pondered \u201c108 million views, and I was like, \u2018Let\u2019s do it!\u2019 Nikisa was like, \u2018This is such a great idea.’\u201d<\/p>\n

It should be noted that Ronda Rousey did approach UFC CEO Dana White to discuss the possibility of fighting under that banner one more time, something which she revealed in a Feb. 17 SportsCenter\u00a0interview.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt didn\u2019t exactly work out with the UFC but it led us to here today,\u201d she said last week on ESPN.<\/p>\n

Bidarian Touches Base with Netflix and Rousey\u2019s Thoughts on Fighter Pay<\/p>\n

As was the case with several high-profile combat sporting events in recent years, Netflix will carry Ronda Rousey\u2019s return to MMA for the first time in close to a decade. \u201cRowdy\u201d recalled Nikisa Bidarian\u2019s process of getting the streaming giant onboard with this contest and expressed her opinion on Netflix broadcasting the fight.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s like, \u2018I\u2019m going to reach out to Netflix and we\u2019re going to make it happen,’\u201d she said. \u201cI\u2019m like, \u2018All right.\u2019 He\u2019s been fantastic and really great to work with. I think what I love about Netflix is they just want to put on the best fight possible.\u201d<\/p>\n

The UFC legend also discussed the issue of wages in MMA.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat I love about MVP is they want to make sure that the fighters are compensated as fairly as possible,\u201d she continued. \u201cI\u2019m so grateful to the UFC and all the opportunities they gave me. I was making zero as an Olympian, but I was able to retire comfortably because of the UFC.\u201d<\/p>\n

Final Thoughts<\/p>\n

While Rousey\u2019s return to the cage will have a definitive outcome known immediately after the final bell, the battle between MVP and the UFC won\u2019t be decided until after the promotion\u2019s respective events are held.<\/p>\n

We have one simple question to pose as we sign off: Will you watch this fight? The answer is yours and yours alone.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ronda Rousey\u00a0will be making a surprising MMA return in less than three months\u2019 time. On May 16, Rousey…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":495380,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[444],"tags":[49,48,641,638,82],"class_list":["post-495379","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mma","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-fighting","tag-mma","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/495379","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=495379"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/495379\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/495380"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=495379"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=495379"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=495379"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}