Ronda Rousey doesn’t feel like she would receive a warm welcome if she ever made an appearance at a UFC event, but that reception won’t determine if she ever goes to another fight or not.
As she was promoting her autobiography over the past few months, the former bantamweight champion and UFC Hall of Famer admitted that a complicated relationship with fans would probably lead to a chorus of boos if she ever walked into an arena to watch some fights. Rousey stated that she felt “vilified” by the media, and because her career ended on a sour note with people claiming she was “exposed” in her final two losses, that she wouldn’t exactly be welcomed back with open arms if she attended a UFC event.
In turns out there are a couple very specific circumstances that would lure Rousey back to attend a UFC show, but it has nothing to do with testing the waters to see how she would be received by fans.
“It’s just one of those things, I don’t want to go to a stadium full of people for fun,” Rousey told CBS Sports. “I’d rather be out on my farm or the beach or something else like that. I think I’d just have to have a reason to go. If my kids end up fighting or something like that or someone that I ended up coaching ends up fighting, I would go. It’s not really my scene anymore.
“When I was younger, I wanted to put on a hot dress and go to the fights and hang out with everybody and now I’m kind of just like an old lady that wants to sit home and sip tea. Plus, I wouldn’t want to go just to be like ‘I wonder how people are going to react to me.’ I would want to have a reason to go or something.”
These days, Rousey’s main priority are the kids she shares with husband and former UFC fighter Travis Browne.
She still practices martial arts from time to time and she’s actually teaching Browne’s former coach Ricky Lundell about the art of judo, but he’s currently her only student. Eventually, Rousey says she will teach her kids martial arts if for no other reason that it’s good to know self-defense, but she also won’t argue with them if they decided to follow in their parents’ footsteps to become a fighter.
“If they wanted to [fight], I would do everything that I could to make sure they’re as great as possible, but I would never push them towards it,” Rousey said. “You can’t make somebody fight. It’s something that’s inside of you that you can’t help.
“I’ll make sure they know how to fight because it’s a survival skill, and I think it builds a lot of discipline. It’s very character developing and all of that. Whether or not they want to compete, it’s up to them.”
If that day comes where one of her children decides to become a fighter, or if Rousey expands to add more students to her martial arts curriculum, then she would be there for them no matter what.
That includes attending a UFC event but otherwise don’t expect to see Rousey in the crowd any time soon.
“I would want to have a reason to go or something. We’ll see. I’ll play it by ear,” Rousey said. “If my kids want to fight, they would end up being like absolutely incredible.
“That’s kind of how my mom got dragged back into judo and stuff like that. She quit judo and never went to a tournament again. Then I got into it, and she was very much involved in it again. If my kids, or the kids from my dojo end up getting into it, then I would have a reason.”
