Julianna Peña sees a path to a third fight with Amanda Nunes.
And it doesn’t go through Kayla Harrison.
During a recent appearance on The MMA Hour, Peña aired her grievances over the two-time PFL’s champion rapid rise up the contender ranks since signing with the UFC in January, starting with all the talk that Harrison may leapfrog her for the chance to face bantamweight champion Raquel Pennington.
“It’s annoying,” Peña said. “What did Dustin Poirier say the other day to Michael Chandler, when he was saying, like, ‘Who are you?’ Not to say, ‘Who are you, Kayla,’ but just to say these girls have been in the UFC forever, so it’s almost a respect thing. Obviously, Kayla’s in the mix and she’ll get her chance as well. It’s just a matter of time at this point.”
Harrison recently made the jump to UFC after a successful PFL run that saw her capture a pair of tournament titles (and their accompanying $1 million prizes), and win 16 of her first 17 fights. She debuted at UFC 300 with a one-sided submission win over former bantamweight champion Holly Holm to position herself as an immediate threat to Pennington’s reign.
Peña wasn’t impressed, essentially calling the matchup a showcase bout for Harrison.
“I know that Holly is a legend and that she has done incredible things in this sport,” Peña said. “I also know that she is in a different trajectory in her career. She’s going a different way. So I feel like they were looking to tout up Kayla as the next biggest thing since sliced bread, and they got that in that fight.”
With Peña out of action for the the past two years, the bantamweight division has seen major upheaval, with longtime champion Amanda Nunes retiring in 2023 and Pennington defeating Mayra Bueno Silva for a vacant belt this past January. Nunes’ retirement particularly stung Peña as she had been booked for a trilogy bout with Nunes at UFC 289 before being forced to pull out with an injury.
Peña defeated Nunes in a shocking upset at UFC 269, then lost a unanimous decision in an immediate rematch at UFC 277. When Nunes made the decision to hang up the gloves, Peña felt robbed of her opportunity to settle their score, and was even more incensed by Nunes seeming to hint that she would come out of retirement for Harrison.
“I was angry, and I’ll tell you why. I took so much heat, that just tacked it on for being the most hated girl [in the UFC], when I was cageside booing Amanda for retiring because I believed in my heart that she was not really done, and I believed that she was prematurely retiring and that she was supposed to fight with me, so I thought that it was a little ridiculous that she was going to just go out 1-1 like that.
“With that being said, when Kayla didn’t call her out and Amanda made the big video about, ‘Why didn’t you say my name,’ it was because I believed the whole time that she wasn’t ready to retire,” Peña said. “So I’m getting crap for booing her, but I still feel the ‘Spidey Senses’ and all that, that she will come back and it’s just a matter of time before she does.”
Before any beef can be settled with Nunes or Harrison, Peña has one goal in mind: Regaining the bantamweight belt.
Peña’s win in the first Nunes fight made her an unexpected champion, and though her reign was short, she feels having a win over one of the greatest fighters of all-time should keep her at the front of any contender talk. So first she’ll deal with Pennington, then consider her options.
“My goal later on — I don’t want to put the cart before the horse — I want to fight Raquel,” Peña said. “I want my belt back. I’m getting my belt back. I want my belt. After that, I will absolutely be calling out Amanda, and I believe that she absolutely will come back because it’s just too big of a fight for her to go away.
“Everyone’s like, ‘Do you believe she’s retired?’ No, I don’t. I think she’s just waiting for a perfect opportunity and that will be the perfect opportunity.”
Peña went on to call a potential matchup with Nunes “the biggest trilogy in women’s combat sports.”
None of Peña’s plans will matter if Harrison’s star power leads to UFC favoring her as an opponent for Nunes should “The Lioness” return to competition. Should that happen, Peña won’t be happy.
“I think it would be cheap, but I wouldn’t be surprised, let’s put it that way,” Peña said. “Crazier things have happened.”
“It’s a little bit ridiculous,” she added. “Like I said, get in line. There’s a pecking order here.”
